


Make a Man Out of You

by kkei2



Category: Disney - All Media Types, Mulan (1998), 木蘭辭 | Mùlán Shī | Ballad of Mulan
Genre: Ancient China, Bisexual Li Shang, Bisexual Male Character, Canon Relationships, Gender Identity, Historical, M/M, Male Friendship, Military, Not Canon Compliant, Other, Period-Typical Sexism, Trans Character, Trans Fa Mulan (Disney), War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-12-16
Packaged: 2020-06-26 12:31:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 60,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19768255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kkei2/pseuds/kkei2
Summary: He backs away from me, his eyes wide with betrayal."You're a... All this time you've..." Shang shakes his head. His voice is unbelievably fragile. "Gods, Ping, you're a girl?" he murmurs.I let out a high, nervous laugh that does nothing to hide my distress. "You seem an awful lot more certain about it than me."Otherwise known as: a very gay interpretation of Reflections, involving Buddhism, bromance, and trying to survive a war while binding.





	1. Reflections

**Author's Note:**

  * For [creativenamesareoverated](https://archiveofourown.org/users/creativenamesareoverated/gifts).



> This is basically a canon complaint about any of those genderbender romances which refuse to acknowledge the existence of bi people, plus my own personal interest in exploring the story of Mulan from the perspective of a trans character. Bromance and identity crises ensue.  
> For a bit of clarification: I'm using the original spelling of Mulan/Ping's surname(Hua) to make it closer to the original ballad.  
> Think of this as...a complex(i.e. confusing), sort of ooc AU of the original Disney movie.

I sit at the loom, my fingers trembling ever so slightly as the shuttle passes quietly back and forth. The task usually soothes me, the gentle monotony of the bobbing shuttle offering some reprieve, but tonight it does nothing to dispel the worry rising in my chest. It must be clear on my face, because when one of my mother’s friends passes by the door she looks in and gives me a sorry smile.

“Are you alright, Hua Mulan? I can hear your sighs from all the way out here. Is there someone on your mind?” I shake my head, offering her a pained grimace in return. If only the thing that troubles me now were just a suitor! If only.

“No, ma’am, it’s just that I saw the draft posters in the square last night.”

“Ah, yes, the ones with the orders from the Emperor. But surely…” She leans against the doorway as I duck my head. I almost cannot bear to say the words out loud, as if that will somehow make them all the more real.

“My father’s name was on every scroll.”

The woman makes a soft clucking sound of apology, but I pay her no mind. Just thinking of it — my old, frail father, with his sweet smile and his trembling fingers — overwhelms me. Before I even realise it hot tears are rolling down my cheeks, burning a path through the pale makeup on my face.

“Father can’t go,” I murmur. “He can’t. He’s old, and weak, and he’ll never —” My voice cracks. My visitor shifts uncomfortably, well aware that this show of grief is not meant for her.

“I’m sorry for your family,” she says quietly, turning to go. “At least he will die defending our land in service of the Son of Heaven.” I have already buried my head in my hands, but I cannot hold back the tears.

Mother’s response is stiff. She does not shed a single tear, nor does she show any outward sign of grief, but I know her well enough to realise that this is just her trying her hardest to stay composed. She cannot fall apart, not in front of me and Yao’er, who is sitting on the kitchen floor playing with his toys. Father simply sits in his chair, gripping the head of his old walking stick. He accepts the news of the draft with a straight face. He is loyal to the emperor, and will do what he must. I sit amongst them, staring at my feet. My face is still puffy and red from crying earlier.

“You can’t go,” I protest weakly. “You’re too old. How do they expect you to be a proper soldier?” Father sighs.

“And what would you suggest I do, daughter? If I were to dodge the draft I would bring shame upon all our heads.”

Mother’s eyes cut to Yao’er, who has begun to chew on a wooden carving of a tiger. He gazes up at us, innocent and oblivious to the strife surrounding him.

“If only we had an older son,” she mutters. “I would be proud to send him off to fight in the name of the emperor.”

“If only I had been born a boy,” I reply, voicing the sentiment she dared not express. My hands grip the edge of the table, and we all stare silently at the kitchen floor.

That night, as I prepare myself to sleep, I have a revelation. Propped up against my wall is the old sparring staff I used to practise with as a child, when my father was well enough to play games with me and even to teach me some of the basics of the martial arts he had trained in in his youth. I am by no means a warrior, but I have always had a knack for sparring, and my father had often joked that if I were born a boy I would be the finest fighter in the emperor’s army. Such memories always bring a strange pang in my heart, which must be from recalling the way my father used to be before sickness made him into the trembling bag of bones he is now. I go over to the staff and pick it up, comforted by the smooth bamboo under my hand. My muscles still remember the moves, and I do an experimental twirl. The blood inside me surges as I fall back into my ten year old body, falling back into the dirt as my father stands over me, broad face beaming.

“You would have made a wonderful son,” he says, helping me to my feet, and my chest tightens. I would do anything to be that son that he wanted. Anything to make him smile like he does when he teaches me how to wield a staff, how to parry and jab and thrust. In that moment when I swing my bamboo blade I am the boy that he so clearly sees in me.I come to my senses when some stray splinter snags on my palm and sends a prick of pain into my hand. Tossing the staff to one side, I go over to the bronze mirror that sits beside my mat. My reflection has always bothered me somewhat — no matter how many times I gaze into the shiny metal surface, there is always something unfamiliar about the face looking back at me, as if there is some subtle distortion that I cannot quite place my finger on. Mother has told me that every young girl feels discontent with her reflection, that even the most beautiful of girls longs to someday see someone else in the mirror. What I see in it now, however, gives me a new spark of hope.

I have always strongly resembled my father, but the features that are striking and handsome on him are rough and unappealing on a girl. Perhaps this is part of why he was so willing to share his warrior’s knowledge with me, with it so easy to see himself in me. Mother would never say it to my face, but I know she fears my lack of delicacy and the untraditional skills I had learned from my father will harm my chances at a good marriage. I have feared the same thing, but the thought of marriage itself as also scared me enough that I try not to contemplate it. My elder sister has been married for many years now, and I cannot imagine living the life of quiet servitude she does.

Looking at myself now, and recalling the feeling of the staff in my hand, a devious plan springs to mind. I pull my hair back, turning my face from side to side. Indeed, if I perhaps darken my brows a bit and find a way to conceal my breasts, I would make a rather convincing man. My parents may not have the eldest son they wish for, but the bureaucrats and officials overseeing the draft don’t know that. As long as there is a man from my family that goes to fight for the emperor my father will be spared, and I will be that man if I must.

When I propose my idea to my parents, they stare at me as if I had just told them I had decided to become a monk and spend the rest of my days on a lonely mountaintop, eating snow and grasshoppers.

“But Mulan!” my mother protests, clutching my father’s hand. “You’d be going off to war. You could die! And what if they find out you’re not a man? What if they had you executed? You’re really not thinking this through!”

“I have thought it through,” I reply, raising my chin. “And I have decided that I am not afraid to die, not in the service of the emperor. If Father goes there is no chance he’ll be coming back, while I have at least some chance of survival. Father taught me well. Who knows, perhaps I will even bring honour upon our family.” I look over to my father, who sits staring in consideration. There is a light in his eyes, the same old one that used to burn when he would play with me out in the yard.

“Hua Mulan,” he says. “Woman though you may be, you are braver than any son I could’ve hoped for.” My heart sings with the praise, just as when I was ten years old. "You are right that if I go off to war it is a sure death sentence. I am too sick, too old, and I could not fight even if I wanted to. While I will go if I must, I would much rather die with dignity in my own home than in some nameless ditch. If you are truly willing to fight for this cause, then I will bestow you with my blessing.” I bow deeply to him. It is a genuine bow, filled with gratitude for his understanding. Of course part of me is afraid of what is ahead of me, but most of me is thrumming with anticipation. I am going to be a soldier. My father is not going to die.

I go out to the markets, and there I purchase all I need: a horse, a fine saddle, a powerful whip, and supplies to last me two weeks. When I return Mother and Father are standing in the doorway with my brother, and I am surprised to see my elder sister there as well.

“I cannot believe you are doing this!” she cries into my shoulder. “You were always such a brave and foolish little girl, Mulan.” I hug her tightly before kissing Mother and Father goodbye. Father gives me a teary smile as he hands me his old armour, worn and dusty but still functional.

“I’m excited to hear what tales of war you’ll have to tell when you return,” he murmurs.

“Father —” I falter, clutching his frail body which was once brimming with vitality. As he pulls away his eyes are shining.

“I have something else for you.” He pulls from behind his back a great sword, the same blade that usually hangs in a place of honour in my parent’s chambers. The sword my father carried into battle, and his father before him, on back many generations to when our ancestors first forged the great thing. I have no words, so I take it with a bow. One last look at my family and I turn back to my horse, heaving myself on with the sword clutched in my hand. Yao’er gives me a little wave and I wave back. A smile creeps onto my face even as I consider that this may be the last time I ever see him. Then, with a squeeze to my mount’s sides, I am off.

The bells on the saddles jiggle merrily as my horse trots along. Despite my destination, I still find myself enjoying my ride out of the village. My new clothes, far more comfortable and functional than any of my dresses at home, seem to safely disguise me from the traveling merchants and dusty wanderers I come across. I have yet to address the issue of my chest, but the loose fabric of my tunic serves me well enough at the moment. The whole time I half except some vagrant to point an accusatory finger at me and cry, “What do you think you’re doing, little girl?” but no such thing happens. Instead I am greeted with nods of respect, carts shifting to the side as I pass by. This newfound freedom is beyond anything I could imagine. Before long I am out of town and deep into the countryside, fields and green hills to either side.

I am admiring the landscape when a voice from behind me calls, “Hail, soldier!” I turn to see a young man riding up beside me, his frisky black mare tossing her head as he slows her to a trot. He has a wide, happy face, his skin glowing golden in the afternoon sun. “At least, I assume you’re a soldier, what with all that heavy armour strapped to your horse.”

“Good afternoon,” I reply cautiously.

“I’m Zhang Wei. And might I ask your name?”

“Hua…” I search desperately for a name. If I’m seen through so soon, before I’ve even registered myself in my father’s stead — “Ping!” The man raises his eyebrows.

“Hua Ping? What, spelled like ‘Flower Vase’? Am I supposed to read into that?” I flush. I’ll never make it through at this rate. My parents will have to accept me back, and I’ll have to deal with the shame I’ve brought upon my household.

“Uh...yes. I guess so.”

“You guess.” He gives me a mischievous smile and I duck my head. “So, Hua Ping, I suppose we are both headed to the same place.”

“Yes.” I keep my voice as low as I can, though it’s still probably best to avoid talking as much as possible. This appears to vex my uninvited companion somewhat, but at least his knotted eyebrows seem to stem from confusion rather than suspicion. He starts up a steady chatter of commentary about the weather, the birds passing overhead, the way his mare keeps chomping at her bit. I listen halfheartedly, his presence stirring up all the fears and unpleasant thoughts that I had previously been able to drown in the pleasant sunshine.

In the evening we stop on the banks of the Yellow River, and I pull out the fresh food that my mother packs for me. Steamed buns (now cold) thick-cut noodles, a myriad of pickled cabbage and vegetables, even a few candied hawthorn berries. To my partial dismay, Mr. Zhang stops his horse right beside mine. It is not that he bothers me so much as having him near me just means I have to spend more time maintaining this charade. Be optimistic about it, I tell myself. This could be good practise. You need to learn how to speak to a man as his equal. I offer him my food and in return he lends me a sip of the liquor he carries with him. It is too strong for my tastes and I return it to him with a grimace. We eat peacefully together, watching the muddy river tumble past as the sun sets on the horizon with a tiny campfire crackling before us. It is rather nice being able to sit with a man like this. Zhang Wei shows no hesitation when he pats me on the shoulder, uses no patronising euphemisms when he describes his prior experience with fighting in order to spare my ‘tender feminine sensibilities,’ and makes no subtle comments about how I should hurry before my time runs out on a decent marriage. It is almost like the freedom I felt when I used to spar with my father, but even then we were not equals. Here we are just two soldiers, and he knows nothing of my father’s status as an honoured war hero, nor that I hunch my shoulders to conceal my breasts from him.

“Alright,” I say at last. “I would like to get to sleep.” Zhang wipes the last traces of the candied hawthorn from his lips.

“Good idea. We’ve both spent a long day riding.”

We both lay our mats out under the stars, but as he settles down I make up some excuse about going to relieve myself and step away from our campfire. Once I’m sure I’m out of his sight, I slip out of my tunic. The piece of cloth that I’ve pulled out is rough, but it is the only bit that I am sure will hold strong against the strain I am about to put it through. Binding my chest is not a particularly difficult task, but as soon as it is done and I try to draw a deep breath I find myself in pain. I cannot breathe properly, and the harder I try the more my chest strains. Frustrated, I almost tear the cloth away before I remind myself that with Mr. Zhang trailing after me I won’t find many other chances to attempt this. After I pull my tunic back on I run my hands down my front, perhaps overly satisfied at the new sensation. For now, at least, I’m safe.

It takes us two weeks to head north to the training grounds, walking our horses side by side as we take in our surroundings and sleeping under the open stars. Zhang Wei proves himself to be a hearty traveling companion, and it does not take long for me to become accustomed to talking to him as a fellow man. I have never had such an easy friendship, not even with a woman. Most of the girls my mother invited over were far too caught up in the constraints of their tedious little lives, gossiping about hair and boys and what the fortune teller had told them was in their stars. I do not fault them for it — they were only doing as was expected of them, filling the mold hey had been forced into in the first place. All the same I am endlessly glad to be free of such things, to instead spend my time sparring with Zhang and practising martial arts at the crack of dawn, free of scrutiny. I still have to be careful around him, of course. Relieving myself in private can be a challenge out on the open road, and once or twice Zhang takes me by surprise as I crouch. This results in me falling over clumsily and generally making a fool of myself as Zhang scratches his head, wondering why a man would react so strongly for just being caught with his pants down. Every night I loosen the bindings on my chest but my ribs ache perpetually.

At the first sight of my bloods I panic and rush to a nearby village. This was something I had briefly considered before I set off, of how I would hide such a thing when I was on the front and had no time to cut cloth and bathe myself, but had put it off with embarrassment. In the village I find an old wise woman and beg her for anything that will purge the pollution from my body. She gives me the concoction reluctantly, warning me that it will leave me barren. I am too out of sorts to care, caught up in images of me waking up in my tent or in some battlements to find my uniform soaked. I cannot risk it. Afterwards, when the mixture has done its work and the searing pain of it has faded from my abdomen, I realise that this means I can never fully return back to my old woman’s life. I’ve just ruined any marriage I might have by destroying my ability to produce an heir. But the more I think about it, the less concerned I am. Good riddance, I am glad to be relieved of it.

The squat little man who I am directed to barely looks at me as I tell him that I am here in place of my father.

“So long as there is one man from each family,” he says dismissively. “It does not particularly matter which man.”

If only he knew. He asks me to demonstrate my skill with a weapon, so I draw my ancestors’ sword and show him some forms, slicing at an invisible opponent. Next he asks for kung fu, and I move with the dedication of a shaolin monk. I have practised long and hard on my journey here. The small nod he gives as he takes down notes tells me that that work has paid off. I leave the building with a pounding heart, thrilled that I have yet again proved myself a man.

Zhang Wei and I are eating together when we receive the news that we have been assigned to the same team. We lean over the scroll, Zhang dropping his rice on it as we stare.

“Captain Li Shang,” he notes. “So he’s General Shang’s son. Yikes.” I raise an eyebrow at him. Being his comrade grants me the right to question him, something I would not have were I his wife.

“Why is that yikes?”

“Oh, officers’ sons, you know. They feel like they have so much more to prove than the rest of us.” He rolls his eyes. “But hey, at least these busy body bureaucrats realise we have some talent. Look.” He gestures to the part on the scroll where it specifies we have ‘prior martial arts training.’ Distinguished. I wonder what Father would think of that.

“I’ll bet you Captain Li is a perfectly decent guy,” I tell Zhang, sticking out my tongue. He smirks.

“You bet? Really?”

“My whole dinner on it, yes.”

We laugh at our childishness, and I dare to sling a brotherly arm around Zhang’s shoulders as we walk down the street. He grins at me and I grin back, comforted by his closeness and the easy way we can walk together. Becoming a man might’ve been the best decision I’ve ever made.

Captain Li, of course, does not prove to be a perfectly decent man. When I first see him, standing tall before us on the training ground, I am struck by how handsome he is. Full lips, sculpted brows, a strong jaw. His chest is broad and underneath his uniform I can tell he is quite muscular. I blush at such an unmanly thought. You fool! I chide myself. Turning back into a woman the moment you catch sight of a handsome man. If you were taking this seriously you would not allow yourself to think in such ways. You are a soldier, remember! Soldiers don’t blush like little girls. I clench my teeth. As hard as I try to look like a man, I still have the heart of a woman. This brings a sense of unease that makes me want to hide my face. Maybe I tied my bindings too tight. Our commander surveys us, a motley crew of soft-faced boys like Zhang mixed with scarred veterans whose muscles have slacked into fat. Most of us must seem greener than a bamboo shoot in springtime to someone like him, a general’s son who has spent half his life in an academy training for this very occasion — though some say that he owes his captaincy only to the good will of his father. Beside Captain Li is the vile little bureaucrat I know to be Chi Fu, likely the same man that wrote the conscription order for my father. He taps Li on the shoulder, and for a moment they turn away towards the commanders’ tents on the far side of the grounds. to discuss something. Apparently a moment is all this uneasy group needs to devolve into animals.

A man shoves roughly past me, knocking me into Zhang.

“Ow,” I cry, more out of reflex than any actual pain. The man turns back to sneer at me.

“What, a little nudge like that too rough for you, pretty boy? Don’t see how a little thing like you thinks he’s going to survive training, much less a battlefield.”

Every part of my womanly upbringing is telling me to hang my head and apologise, to do anything I can to draw attention away from myself. My mother has always complimented me on how quiet and demure I am. Looking into those gleaming piggy eyes, however, I can’t help but wonder if that was nurture, not nature. It’s certainly not what the men around me are expecting of me. Many of them have turned to look at us now, their anticipation almost palpable. Even as my brain gives into its conditioning, I know what I must do. I must defend my honour. So, with one glance back at Zhang, who raises his eyebrows significantly, I take a step forward and crack the man across the face with a punch. I’ve never hit someone square on before. All the martial arts training with my father was always carefully poised and choreographed, with half the effort going towards halting ones’ blows at the last second. Before he even has time to strike back I’m reeling away in pain. My entire hand throbs, knuckles bloodied from where they connected with his cheekbone.

“You little harlot,” he snarls, and he is on me. I’m too giddy to respond. The adrenaline already pumping through my veins is making it impossible to see clearly. All the moves I spent hours practising are gone in an instance, and all I can think about is the pain in my knuckles. As he lunges at me all I can do is squawk in shock and throw myself out of the way, onto the feet of the onlookers. Our audience roars with excitement, and suddenly fights are breaking out all throughout the crowd. Apparently the fact we were recognised for our fighting experience suggests nothing about our maturity. I’m too busy dodging blows to notice much of this, though. I slip and land on my back in the mud of the training ground, and the huge man comes down on top of me. He yanks me up by the collar of my new training tunic and aims a powerful vengeance punch right at me, but the muddy ground lends me just enough lubrication to twist away. The move only saves me the one time, for he’s still on top of me and pinning me down with his weight. I’m too small — Too frail — I was delusional to think I’d survive a minute among these men — The blow catches me on the mouth, my upper lip breaking against my teeth. I let out a gasp of pain, everything around me mud and blood and suffering and that huge, huge man, bearing down on me with his massive fists.

“Soldiers!”

The man leaps off me and the fighting around me comes to a halt. I looking up dizzily to see Captain Li standing before us, his face tight with anger and disgust. His dark eyes burn as he glares at all of us. “What is the meaning of all this?” he asks. His voice is icy.

“I-It was his fault!” says the man who shoved me, pointing down at me. “He started it!”

The other recruits stare at me and back away, water retreating from floodlands, leaving me high and dry. I sit up clumsily, my mind still whirling from the adrenaline and pain. Li stalks towards me. For a second I think he’s going to help me to my feet, but instead he yanks me up forcefully by my collar just as my attacker did.

“Is this true? I don’t need delinquents stirring up trouble in my camp.”

My mind falters. Up close, his face is just as lovely as it appeared when I first glimpsed him from across the field. Long lashes frame his delicately curved eyes, and his full lips, prominent before, are positively distracting now. I would never had such bold thoughts before all this. Why is it that the moment I begin to dress and act as a man my brain decides to supply such girlish thoughts? Then again, if I were in a dress and painted face right now as opposed to this rough uniform with a bound chest, I doubt he would draw me so close. To my horror he must notice some sign of my attraction on my face, for something unreadable flickers in his eyes for a moment and he lets go of me slightly.

“Well?”

My whole face is burning. What a wit I am!

“S--sorry, sir! It’s just that I —” My voice cracks painfully. I turn my face away from him and lock eyes with an animated Zhang, who is nodding his head as he pantomimes something. I narrow my eyes in confusion but attempt to follow his cue. “I was...Well, you know how it gets with men sometimes! Especially us soldiers. Blood’s just always boilin’. Out under the sun, I just started itching for a bit of a scrap, yuhnno? Killing things, uh, being outdoors. All that yang just building up in me, haha!” I have never been so ineloquent since my first few days with Zhang, and then I had had the option of remaining silent.

Li presses his lips together, and part of me almost laughs at how seriously he seems to be considering the bullshit that just came out of my mouth. Thankfully my tongue does not have quite that much of a deathwish and keeps quiet.

“What’s your name?”

“Wha?” I reply intelligently.

“Your name, soldier! Answer your superior!”

“My name…Of course.” By the gods, my head still hasn’t settled. Zhang has been referring to me by it the past few weeks, you damned idiot! At this rate I wouldn’t be surprised if I don’t even respond to Mulan. “My name is Hua…” I suddenly remember the look on Zhang’s face when I had first spluttered the ridiculous lie. _What, like flower vase_? “Ping! I’m Hua Ping.”

Li furrows his brows even further in bemusement.

“Alright, man. Let me see your papers.”

All I have is my father’s original conscription notice, waved away by the little bureaucrat who assessed me at the headquarters the other day. I have kept it tucked into my sash, just in case someone comes by and decides to conduct a more thorough investigation than he did. Obviously the only thing that mattered to him was that I was another fresh body. I show these to my captain. His eyes light up as he reads my father’s name and I know he’s recognised it.

“Look at this,” he says to his supervisor lurking nearby. “This lad here’s the son of a war hero!” Chi Fu regards me with a sour expression. My heart thuds, no longer in connection to my fight, though there is still blood trickling down from my lip.

“I do not recall old Hua Zhou having a son. I certainly did not notice one when I was looking through family registers to draw up conscription notices.”

“Yeah,” I falter, terrified that this rat of a man will see by means of a slip of paper what my body has not yet betrayed. “My father and I… Never on great terms. I would not be surprised if he did not speak of me much. Sometimes I swear he would’ve preferred a girl over me.” My smile is the best I can muster, yet still it feels weak and shaky. Chi Fu curls his lips at me. “

Tragic. Though with a little creature like you I’m sure it wouldn’t be much of a stretch for you to serve as a daughter.”

Captain Li looks up from the paper at last. He glances at me briefly, his brown eyes shining with a new light. If I didn’t know better I might even say he looks intrigued, but with blood running down my chin and my uniform covered in mud it’s probably just amusement at my expense. “

Very well, then. Hua Ping, son of Hua Zhou you may be, but I’m afraid I still must punish you. The rest of these rotten troublemakers as well.”

He looks out over the troop, which has been watching the proceedings with surprising patience.

“You all are sentenced to count every last grain of rice in our storehouse. Work quickly and perhaps you’ll be able to go to bed at a decent time tonight. If I were you I’d try to get as much sleep as possible — your first real training starts tomorrow. And you,” he says, turning back to me. “Go to the healer’s tent and see if they can do anything about that lip, okay?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... I'm assuming you made it to the end of this first long ass chapter. If so, thank you! This is the very first 'serious' fic that I've actually managed to write more than a few pages of, and it's readers that makes all the time that goes into this that makes it feel worthwhile.   
> To all my new readers as of 3/18, I'm doing a new batch of edits and am considering adding in honourifics. They're something I decided to steer clear of initially because they usually require a glossary, but they do add a lot to the historical aspect. What do y'all think? Should I add in honourifics or would you have an easier time without them?🤔 Let me know.


	2. I'll Make a Man Out of You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second chapter is HERE! A warning that this hasn't been 100% proofread, so this may not be the final version.

“Hua Ping. _Ping._ Wake up, idiot.”

“What is it?” I mumble, turning over on my mat. When I look up sleepily I half expect to see Yao’er crouched beside me, big baby eyes peering down at me in excitement. The face I do see is much less cute.

“Ugh, Zhang, get out of my face.” I shove at him half heartedly and attempt to tuck myself back in. My friend is having none of it. 

“Come on, we’ve got training this morning. If you don’t get ready soon we’ll be late.” He shakes me roughly and at last I relent, unfurling myself and getting groggily to my feet. My busted lip has swelled and purpled overnight, but at least the cloth the medic gave me stopped the bleeding. 

“How long were we up in that damn storehouse?” I ask, holding my spinning head in my hand. Zhang gets up and pulls a jug from his belt. “Later than I would’ve preferred, at least when there isn’t alcohol involved. But maybe the man who got us into all that trouble in the first place shouldn’t be complaining.” He hands me the jug. “Here. I brought you water. Wash up a bit.”

I take it gratefully, pulling out the stop and pouring some of the cool water into my cupped hand. “Like you didn’t encourage me to hit that guy,” I grumble between splashes of water. It soothes my damaged face but I still don’t feel particularly revived. 

“ _Encourage_ ?” Zhang protests, completely incredulous. “Why would I _encourage_ you to sock a hulking beast in the face like that?”

I glare at him. “I saw that look you gave me. You clearly wanted me to do it.”

He throws up his hands. “Okay, so maybe in the moment I might’ve been a little overexcited. But in the end you’re still the one that took that swing.”

I pass him back the jug and tuck the damp strands of hair behind my ear. He takes a massive swig before disappearing it into the folds of his uniform again.

“Do you think it was all that bad of an idea?”

“What, was hitting a guy in the face in front of our superior officer and making yourself an enemy of the entire troop a bad idea?”

The shove I give him is not entirely playful, but he takes it in stride, pulling me with him into the side of the tent. We tussle for a bit like little boys before I straighten up again, glaring down at him.

“What I mean is, do you think I defended my honour? Proved myself, maybe.”

“Proved yourself to be a damned idiot, maybe,” Zhang replies, pushing himself up from the ground. “What kind of a question is that, Hua? Are you worried about getting shoved around again?”

Seeing him sitting there, looking up at me from the floor of my tent, I almost want to confide in him. Relieve myself of the burden that’s been weighing me down since I first set out, to have my new and greatest friend on my side in all this. But I can’t. As good a companion Zhang Wei is, he’d be off like a jack rabbit if he knew what I was hiding. So I instead opt for partial truths.

“Well, what the man said was true. I’m such a runt compared to most of the other soldiers, and I’m so awkward and scatterbrained that I’ll probably end up in a ditch before I ever see a battlefield, just like he told me.” My voice begins to climb an octave with the build in emotions. I force it back down, avoiding Zhang’s sorry gaze. I can’t fall apart here. Not now, probably not until I’m back home in my mother’s arms. Home…

“I’m just a pretty boy, and not even a competent one like the stupid captain,” I mumble.

Zhang seems at a loss. He sheepishly reaches out a hand towards me before quickly drawing it back. He’s probably never seen a friend on the verge of tears like this before, because of course a real man wouldn’t let himself be brought to such lows and to grizzle over rude comments by strangers. 

“You’re being too hard on yourself,” he says at last, his usually sunny voice serious. “I’ve sparred with you. I’ve seen you up practising your martial arts forms before I’ve even eaten breakfast. And to answer the question you asked earlier, yes, I do think you’ve proven that you’ll fight for your honour, even if it ended poorly for you. Don’t take what that ass said to heart. You’re still a better soldier than me.”

I look up at him, the looming tears finally gone, and he smiles gently at me. My heart swells for a moment, grateful that the gods have guided a man like this to my side.

“Zhang —” I begin. He turns suddenly, back to his usual bouncy self.

“Come on, we’re probably late now! Pull a tunic on, let’s get going. You don’t want to get the captain angry _again,_ do you?” He lifts up the flap and looks back at me. “Try not to fight any fights when you get there, huh? Or, if you do, maybe win them this time. Your lip there won’t survive another bruising, I’m afraid.”

I scowl at him, though inwardly it is a relief to see him acting the rascal again. There’s my Zhang Wei, brother of my heart! Not that I can ever let him know I think of him that way. The teasing would be merciless. “Out with you, fiend. Let me have a bit of privacy and I’ll be right with you.”

“Alright, but I get your rations for today. In case you forgot, let me remind you that you lost your bet, _big time._ ”

“ _Out.”_

He shrugs and lets the flap fall, leaving me in darkness. I stand in silence for a brief moment before finally turning away. 

  


By the time I’ve made myself presentable, everyone else has already assembled.I rush breathlessly over to the training ground and tuck myself into the back of the group. A few of the men glance over at me but are quickly distracted when the captain steps forth. 

“I would’ve hoped for a more swift and orderly assembly,” he calls out drily. “Perhaps you can improve upon that next time. If not, you can enjoy another night of counting grains.”

I attempt to pay attention, but the cold morning dew is soaking into my boots and my stomach grumbles unpleasantly. Zhang will likely make good on his promise of taking my rations too. This is all going swimmingly. My mind drifts between my various torments, staring unseeing somewhere above the captain’s head until I am brought back into focus by Li suddenly pulling off his shirt. My eyes go wide and my heart skips a beat, again stupidly compelled by his beauty.

At least I am not entirely alone in my admiration of our captain, because the man standing beside me lets out a low whistle and elbows the guy next to him.

“How long has it been since you looked like that, Yao?” he asks his neighbour.

“ _Please_ shut up,” the man replies through clenched teeth.

I let out a small snort without realising it, and they turn to look at me. 

“You’re that idiot from yesterday,” the one called Yao hisses, earning him an eye roll from a third man standing behind him.

“If I were you I’d really consider seeing a doctor about that stick up your ass, Yao. It would do humanity a favour.”

Yao looks like he’s about to offer a scathing reply when Captain Li looks over at us.

“Is that Mr Ming I hear back there? Since you seem so enthusiastic about all this, how about you go first?”

The man’s jaw drops and he glances at his two friends in silent fury as he walks his way through the mass of men and up to where Li is standing. 

The captain smiles at him sweetly, a hint of wickedness evident in the curve of his lips. It is this hint of humour, of something beyond the stern-faced captain who stands so resolutely before us, that truly intrigues me. The pretty face and prince-worthy muscles that now ripple in the sun may pink my cheeks, but it is the light dancing in his eyes that fills me with a sudden desire to please him and prove myself a worthy soldier. I want to know this Captain Li Shang with the fond closeness that I know Zhang Wei. My newfound masculinity will often me more opportunities than I ever had in my past life, I am sure of it.

“Now,” he explains to the sour-faced Yao, “I’m going to shoot this arrow into the top of that pole over there, and all you’ve got to do is shimmy up and grab it. Understand?”

The soldier nods, and Li retrieves his bow and quiver from the ground. His gaze is one of utter focus as he notches an arrow and draws back the bow, muscles flexed. With perfect aim, he sends the arrow into the wood at the top of the post with a thud. 

Yao sets off towards the pole when the captain stops him.

“Here,” he says, handing him two heavy medallions. “These are for strength and discipline, two values I’m sure you, good soldier, are not lacking in.”

Yao lets Li secure the weights to him even as he stares back at us with wide, incredulous eyes. 

We watch, silent and expectant, hungry for his failure. He makes it up only a _chi_ or so before his weight begins to drag him back down and his sweaty hands slip on the slick wood. When his backside hits the ground the captain only sighs.

“Next?” Li calls expectantly.

Though all of us have had that subtle nod in our favour from the emperor’s paper pushers, it becomes clear that what Captain Li expects out of us is on another level. 

I watch, sweating profusely under my training uniform, as all the men before me try and fail to make it to the top. By the time I’m next in line, the wood is dark with sweat and covered in scratches where desperate men scrabbled for a hold. 

I stare at my feet (as if that will somehow keep Li from noticing me) until I hear a throat clearing in front of me.

“Hua Ping,” Li says smoothly. “You so eagerly demonstrated your fighting abilities yesterday. I’m excited to see what you have to offer us today.”

The blood rises in my cheeks, and I stand as awkwardly as a gangly teenage boy. Then, summoning my courage, I snatch the two medallions he proffers me.

“Of course, captain,” I mumble, marching towards the pole as forcefully as possible in order to hide the trembling of my legs. Please, ancestors or gods or whoever is listening, don’t have me be humiliated again. As long as I can get higher than that stick in the mud Yao…

I grip the slick wood firmly, medallions swaying. It can’t be all that hard, can it? As long as I don’t too much stress on my upper body, which is inevitably weaker than my comrades’, I should be able to make it up just a bit. I hitch myself up as if I am trying to engulf the whole thing in my embrace, the muscles of my inner thigh already burning. Splinters stick out from the scratches, catching on my uniform as I attempt to push myself up by my feet, but my shoes slip uselessly on the wood. With a grunt of frustrating I haul myself upwards, every muscle in my upper body taunt.

The martial arts and sword fighting I have been practising has certainly made me more toned than an ordinary lady would be, but I simply cannot compete. I manage to shimmy inelegantly just under halfway up before sliding uselessly to the ground. My backside hits the dirt painfully. That’s sure to leave another bruise. As I stand in defeat I earn a tired look from my captain. Li sighs. 

“Not the worst I’ve seen today, but definitely not by any means good.” He turns to survey the rest of the conscripts.

“The draft clearly stated that it was _men_ we were looking for, but based off what I’ve witnessed from you lot today it seems like I’ve been sent a load of sniveling _daughters_ to play nursemaid for instead. Your performance has been dismal, soldiers, and this is just the first day of training. The challenges I have laid out for you are only going to get more intense from here. HOWEVER.” He swings around to face me. I blink as benignly as possible, still somewhat rattled by his comment about daughters. “I promise, by the time we’re called to the front, I’ll make a man out of you.” 

I can feel his gaze just as intently as the sweat running down my back and pooling uncomfortably under my bindings. The irony of it all is enough to make my heart stutter. 

I hope you’re right, Captain Li. If you don’t make a man out of me soon then I’ll never survive this.

That night I lie in my tent, tossing and turning on my mat until I finally give up on any hopes of sleep and stare up into the darkness. Outside I can hear the sounds of men snoring and whispering to their companions, the air filled with gentle night time noises. Well, some of that snoring might not be considered ‘gentle,’ but at least everything is at relative peace for once. I wonder what things will sound like when we’re out on the front; what war sounds like. Father has always spoken of war like it was some illustrious thing, a place where a man can prove himself and find his destiny, but I have seen a shadow pass over his face when he sits at the table. Something still haunts him, and it preys upon him most when he recalls that battle where he carved his fame from another man’s corpse.

Every time I try to imagine what it’ll be like I find myself suffocating under a blanket of terror, so I put it out of my mind and instead get to my feet. The moon is bright as I steal out of my tent and head for the training ground. My body is worn and my lip still unpleasantly swollen, but if I want to stay abreast the others then I must put in that extra effort. Even a simple farmer’s boy has an advantage of me, for a bit of playful teachings from my father do not make up for the fact that I have spent my life idle. Weaving, painting, and playing pretty tunes on the guzheng had not seemed so bad at the time, but a soldier they do not make. 

The pole stands solitary in the moonlight. With the tents and storehouses behind me I feel exposed, waiting for a nightwatchman to call out to me as I walk out into the center of the training grounds. Dew collects on my bare feet as I make my way over, and I wipe it clumsily off on my trousers. Extra slipperiness will get me nowhere. Staring up to where the arrow still remains stuck to the post, I begin to feel unsure. I came here in a half conscious daze, this isn’t a good idea, I need energy for tomorrow, I’m not going to prove anything if I spend my whole time here exhausted and bruised — 

I block out my insecure thoughts, instead focusing only on my hand against the wood. How should I position my hands? How can I compensate for my weaker upper body? How will I overcome this? It’s so much easier to plan things out like this when I’m alone and don’t have to worry about everyone’s eyes on my back. Being perceived is such an ordeal. My bare feet have better purchase on the smooth surface than my shoes, so I hoist myself up and grip with my toes. My thighs still scream but I no longer feel like I’m sliding down quite as quickly. I make it up quite a bit higher than I did the first time, though still nowhere near the top. 

Father spoke of soldiers he met from the mountains that would coat their hands and feet with chalk so they would stay dry. I doubt I will find any chalk readily at hand, but maybe rice flour? Then I would be able to work on my muscular strength without having to worry about sweat. The storehouse—

“Who’s there?”

I jump so far out of my skin that I probably startle the moon rabbit working his mortar and pestle as I go past. Turning around I see none other than Captain Li walking towards me. I open my mouth to speak, horrified to be seen like this. As he comes closer I can see the captain’s eyes glittering in the pale moonlight. 

“Is that you, Hua Ping? I didn’t recognise you with your hair down.” His voice is more gentle than the way he speaks in front of the other men, and it makes me somewhat uncomfortable to hear the man who called me a girl address me as if he knows me. His own hair is pulled back loosely, the free strands framing his angular face. 

“Yeah,” I reply dumbly. “It’s me. Sorry if I’m — “

He raises a hand to silence me. “No need to apologise. I just wasn’t expecting to find someone out here.” His eyes look past me to the pole I had been attempting to climb. “A bit of advice, soldier, you’re better off getting a proper night’s rest than keeping at that. A well rested amateur can do better than a worn-out pro.” 

I nod, still formulating a response. It may be clear enough what I’m doing out here, but what is _he_ doing out here? And why is he just making small talk? Some part of me is silently turning to hysterics at the impropriety of a man and a woman talking alone together at night — but I’m not a woman. Not right now, I mean. We are two men standing together, and there is nothing scandalous to that.

Li tilts his head at me. 

“Are you feeling insecure, Hua? That maybe you’re lacking something compared to the others?”

It takes me a moment to realise that this question isn’t rhetorical, nor apparently a way to mock me. 

“I mean, I am a lot smaller than most of the other guys,” I mumble. “Heightwise and just... size in general.”

The captain exhales. “I’m assuming that had something to do with why you hit that man yesterday. A rash move, if not a common one. Small dogs always are the first to bite.”

Is my commanding officer comparing me to a blasted Pekingese? More apt than he might realise, I smile to myself, seeing as my chest binding make me breathe like one.

“I’m sorry,” I say again. Apologising seems to be the less offensive answer to anything he might say. “I promise I will not behave like that again, sir. From now on I will strive to be a better soldier and a better man.”

Am I not seeing correctly in the dark or is Captain Li smiling?

“Good,” he says. “I will be expecting more out of you from now on then. Go back to bed. There’s a lot in store for tomorrow.”

I bob a quick bow before heading back towards my tent. As I leave I swear I catch a look of something forlorn in the captain’s eyes, as if he is regretting an opportunity he has just lost.

This time I manage to wake just before Zhang barges into my tent, tightening the bindings I loosened in the night. Is my chest really flat enough beneath my tunic? Smoothing my hand over it I can still feel that firmness, and I fret constantly that if someone looks at me from a certain angle they will see a gentle swell there. When I did this that first night with Zhang I had felt relieved that there was a way to disguise myself, but now no matter how tight I tie the bindings I still feel like my chest still does not lie flat enough. If only I could deal with it like I did my bloods — a day or so of terrible pain, and then my life rid of that filth and torment forever. Do women with large chests ever wish to be free of it? Surely they would be glad to no longer suffer through that discomfort.

Zhang greets me at the entrance to my tent and we hurry off to breakfast. I am especially keen on mine, as Zhang made sure to help himself to my dinner last night. As we stand in line with our food bowls and chopsticks I almost tell him about what happened last night, but dismiss it as unimportant. Zhang would probably just respond with some jabs about me staying up to practise more, anyway. Whatever. 

Captain Li passes out staffs to all of us, and I am glad for it. Holding the staff in my hand reminds me of why I came here in the first place, and for a moment I feel closer to the father I haven’t seen in weeks. I find myself close to the three men from the other day. Yao throws me a displeased look as usual, clearly still resenting the fact I lost him a night of sleep due to my recklessness. His friend Ling only smiles impishly at Zhang and me.

“What’s up with those guys?” Zhang hisses. I shrug, truthfully not entirely sure.

“Alright, men, I hope you’re ready for some proper exercises today!” Captain Li shouts. “Yesterday was just warmups. Today we’re moving on to actual combat practises. Some of you should have experience with that already, if not most of you.”

I swing my staff experimentally towards Zhang. “He means me, of course” I mouth, and my friend rolls his eyes. 

“Of course, O Great Warrior.”

“I’m serious. Are you forgetting how many times I disarmed you when we sparred.”

“I’m not forgetting, but I’m certainly not _remembering_ it because it never happened.”

I jab him with the staff. 

Li demonstrates his academy-honed skills to us, spinning like a storm and perfectly striking the targets he flips up into the air. I must confess, I’m impressed. Zhang too looks sufficiently humbled. 

“It is becoming endlessly clear to me,” he mutters, “that the men who put us in this group were bureaucrats and not soldiers.”

I cannot disagree with that. 

We’re about to pair off to practise when the man I know only as Ling comes innocently up to us. 

“Sorry, do either of you have partners? My two friends are paired off over there.” He gestures at Yao and his large companion. Neither of them seem to know what’s going on. “You know how that feels, I’m sure, when you’re with two of your friends but then your commanding officer says ‘Get into pairs!’ and then they just look right at you and choose each other?? The amount of betrayal and heartache I’m going through right now — surely you have some pity for me?”

Zhang and I just look at each other. 

“Er,” I reply, “I’m afraid you’ll have to look elsewhere.”

The man gives us a pleading look. “You’d really cast me to the dogs like that? Now I’ll have to go asking every rough and tumble Tan, Di, and Hai in this place.”

“I’m sorry?” 

I turn away from him shaking my head. He makes one last over the top whining noise before presumably slinking away. Suddenly I feel something tickle the base of my neck and I tense. 

“Hua…” Zhang says, but I’m too far gone. The little legs scratch at my back. I back away frantically, as if I can somehow escape it that way. As I scrabble desperately at my back I don’t notice where my staff is going.

“What the hell!” someone yells. My trailing staff has knocked him to the ground. Yet again I have sent the troop into chaos, as I dodge angry swings and accidentally trip more unfortunately in my desperate attempt to remove the beast. 

Someone comes up behind me and I instinctively swing, attempting to avoid getting struck over the head by one of my irritated comrades. The person who catches it, however, is a displeased Captain Li. 

“I thought you promised to be a proper soldier from now on,” he says dryly. I at last get myself free of the thing and it scuttles away. Looking back at Li I am hurt by the disappointment on his face. As if he was really expecting something of me, and now I’ve failed him. My lips part as everything I want to say to him threatens to tumble out — how I’m trying my hardest, I really am, and I’m actually not all that incompetent but the odds are stacked against me, and I shouldn’t really be here in the first place but I’ll do whatever it takes to make sure I stay here — 

“Sorry,” is all I can muster, that empty word again. 

Li shakes his head.

“Just get back to your position, soldier.”

Ling snickers as I walk back to where Zhang is waiting, and I shoot him a venomous look.

“If you do something like that again, it’s not the invaders you’ll have to worry about,” I hiss. I should feel odd saying words that go so against my character, but I’m so frustrated, so angry, so terrified for my position that I take a dull joy from the wide eyed expression on his face. 

Zhang says nothing to me for the rest of the exercise. 

Training carries on, and before long it becomes routine. My body throbs every night when I go to sleep and I have to keep my bindings as loose as possible so I can actually breathe, but I am impressed with the new power I feel. My arms have finally gained some definition so I now spend an embarrassing amount of time running my hands over the bulge of muscle standing out from my shoulder. At one point I suddenly remembered a lady should not be impressed with muscle unless they are on her husband, but I’ve become even more dissociated with the concept of womanhood beyond the frustration of my chest and body that it quickly slips my mind again. Who cares what a lady should be impressed by, anyway? I have worked hard to get myself like this.

Every day Li leads us through a variety of exercises — sparring, archery, balancing pots on our heads with one leg crossed (one of my least favourites, and I would argue best left to monks and legendary heroes, not those of us that are lacking in god-given powers of mind and bottom), even catching fish. This one proves to be quite fun, even if some of the men grumble that the captain should pick a somewhat more specifically military activity for us. All in all I feel like I have come to settle in quite well, and despite the constant training any thoughts of war lay far from my mind. 

One clear day when we have a brief few hours of rest while the captain goes to speak with his father, Zhang and I are wandering listlessly through camp. I catch sight of my reflection in a puddle and seeing my grimy face reminds me that the last time I had anything resembling a bath was when I was dunked in the river by Yao and Co during fish practise. 

“Zhang,” I say tentatively. “I think I’d like to take a bath. In the river. Away from Yao and Co.”

Zhang doesn’t even look at me. “And? Why are you informing me of this?”

“Because…” I kick the dirt in front of me. If only I had the option of telling him. “I don’t want any of those clowns playing pranks on me while I’m completely naked, so I was wondering if you’d be willing to be my lookout.”

“Of course.”

My shoulders relax slightly, which Zhang catches immediately, 

“Did you think I was going to turn you down? What kind of friend do you think I am?”

One who, no matter how loyal, would never trust me again if I told him the truth. I shake my head. Zhang sighs.

“We’ve been together for all these months, and I would hope by now…”

His cheery face is uncharacteristically gloomy. Have I really hurt him? It is true, I have been holding out on him.

I reach out for him, hoping to comfort him with my actions as I cannot do with my words.

“Zhang. You know you’re my best friend, like a brother even.”

My hands squeeze his, the anguish that creeps into my voice completely genuine. Even if our friendship depends on him never finding out who I am, it’s true: I do love him like a brother, and if I could have anything in the world it would be that I really was the brother he wanted as well.

“Well then.” He looks up, his eyes no longer dark. “I think you should start calling me Wei.”

I let out a quick breath of surprise before restraining myself. I’ve never been on a first-name basis with a boy except my brother. 

“Are you sure?” I ask, afraid that even with his permission I’d be stepping too far.

“We’ve know each other for a while now, and have spent more time together in the past few weeks than most best friends probably spend in a year,” he assures me. “Yes, I’m sure. I don’t want any sort of formality standing between us. We’re brothers, after all.”

I cannot help but smile. “Alright, Brother Wei. I suppose you should call me Ping, then.”

“Already on it.” He lets go of my hands, no sign of what just passed between us except for the glow in his eyes. “Now, shouldn’t you be headed for that bath? You smell like a goat.”

I slip out of my tunic and let it fall to the ground. Next are my bindings, and I draw a free breath for the first time in the last few days. My ribs are bruised slightly where the binding has pressed into them, and even with the bindings gone my breaths are still more shallow than they should be. If only there was some other solution to this, other than cutting my chest off completely. Not something I plan on doing anytime soon. This is the first time I’ve been completely naked in a while. So often while changing I keep undergarments and shifts on, with the intent of concealing myself even if someone walks in on me — but the discomfort at finally seeing myself again, all the bare skin and parts I have kept under wraps for so long, makes me wonder if perhaps I had been hiding my nakedness from myself as well.

The cold water feels good on my sore muscles, and I at last let myself relax. Somewhere behind me, up on the hilltop, Zha— Wei is on look out, making sure the Three Dumbasses don’t ruin my alone time. For once I should feel free and safe, to let my guard down. Yet even as I let my hair down and lean back so it fans out in the water like dark seaweed, there is still an underlying unease. Being without my disguise, even alone, feels like having my skin peeled back to reveal bare flesh. I sigh and let myself sink into the water, relishing the cold as it rushes over my tired face and teases my hair out behind me.

“Woohoo!” 

There is a great splash of water, and someone leaps into the deep part of the stream just a few lengths down from me. I jerk up instantly, backing into the darker, murkier water where my sun-tanned skin is somewhat more obscured. As the newcomer comes up for air I half expect to see Wei, but to my horror it is Chien Po, the largest member of Yao and Co. He’s quickly followed by Yao and Ling, the lot of them just as naked as me. Will I really be punished just for trying to practise some basic hygiene.

Ling comes up for air and turns towards me, as if he has just noticed me. Damned liar.

“Oh, hey,” he calls. “Didn’t realise you were there. Sorry.”

I fight back a defensive remark. “No, no. Not an issue. I’m leaving right now actually.”

The riverbed is slimy and covered with rocks, and I slip slightly as I back away. 

“Are we scaring you off? Too bad. I was hoping to talk to you for a bit soldier.”

“What?” I snap. So much for restraint.

Ling raises his eyebrows. “I get why you’re angry. Yao and Chien Po and I have been pretty shitty to you since training started.”

“Hey! I haven’t done anything!” Chien Po protests. Yao rolls his eyes.

“Yet you have stood by and laughed at everything this moron does. Enabling is just as bad as bullying. Not that I have too much of an issue with bullying anyway, at least when it’s directed at certain people.” He glares at me.

Ling laughs uncomfortably. “Oh, drop the attitude, Yao.” He turns back in my direction. “Actually, I wanted to ask if we could put all that bad blood behind us. Water under the bridge, so to speak.” He splashes in the river as if to demonstrate his point. 

As much as I would like to think that Ling is honestly offering a chance for us to set our differences aside, I cannot help but distrust him after all he’s done. All of the older men have been rather keen on seeking out the chinks in my armour, and taking off that armour altogether seems incautious. Plus, being totally naked does not necessarily lend itself well to peaceful negotiations. 

“I’ve really got to go,” I repeat, hugging my arms to my chest and sinking lower into the water. “Maybe we can talk about this later? When everyone has some clothes on?”

“Oh, the clothes are no problem for us. Talking all this out in the nude like real men shouldn’t pose a problem.”

 _Whether or not_ you’re _comfortable isn’t what I’m concerned about,_ I think. Thankfully, I don’t have to worry about keeping this up any longer because Ling leaps out of the water with a yelp.

I close my eyes so as to not experience any more unsavoury nudity.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Yao asks.

“I’ve been bitten! Or stung! I don’t know, something just got me! Look, it’s already forming a welt,” Ling whines. 

“Don’t be such a baby,” Yao grumbles, before he too is sent scrambling with a sharp intake of breath. “Shit! What on earth — “

Ling yelps again, and this time I hear a low whizzing pass by my head before it happens. So not a malicious insect after all. The three men get up in a hurry, hollering and waving their hands in the air as they attempt to escape from the terrible invisible biters. I open my eyes and see Zhang Wei standing on the bank, smirking and tossing a small pebble from hand to hand. 

“Took you long enough,” I grumble. 

Wei throws the rock, and it splashes just to the side of my head.

“Maybe someone could be a little bit more grateful?” he teases, eyes glittering mischievously. 

“Sure.” I splash a bit of water at him and he falls back giggling. “Now could you leave? I’m still trying to bathe here.”

As Wei and I come walking back into camp, me shivering slightly with my wet hair down and Wei halfheartedly grumbling about how high-maintenance my privacy habits make me, Captain Li steps out of the General’s tent. He stops and looks at us, though if I’m not mistaken his gaze lingers on me a bit longer than it does my friend.

“Soldiers,” he greets us. Li’s eyes are dark and rimmed with heavy bags, clearly subdued by whatever he’s been discussing with Chi Fu and his father.

We bob in respect. 

“Is something the matter, Captain?” I ask, hoping to sound merely politely concerned. Wei elbows me in the side.

The Captain shakes his head wearily, his eyes downcast. “Bad news from the front. My father’s scouts caught sight of a party of the Rouran about a day’s ride from the border just north of here. It seems that this tenuous peace we’ve been experiencing for the past few months is finally about to break.”

His eyes flick back to us. Perhaps he is wondering if he told us too much. “Your training is nearly over, soldiers. In a few weeks time you’ll be at war.”

Wei and I exchange glances before looking back to our captain.

“No disrespect, sir, but are you sure we’re ready for that, sir?” 

Captain Li’s features sharpen, as if this is something he is tired of being asked. 

“Everyone seems keenly lacking in faith.”

There is a rustling of fabric as Chi Fu exits the tent. He acknowledges us with a look of disgust.

“Perhaps that is a failing of their captain, Mr. Li,” he suggests. “After all, is it not your duty to inspire faith?”

The captain’s fists bunch, and I can tell that this is a point of weakness for him.

“Your father may be general,” Chi Fu continues. “But I am the Emperor’s advisor, and I will not let any incompetence slide just because of your parentage.”

Li turns away from the man. I am startled by how vulnerable he seems, and the way Wei shifts next to me I can tell he feels the same. We’d heard the talk that Li had his position handed to him by his father, but had thought of it just as something for hard worked soldiers to complain and gossip about, not something his own supervisor would use against him.

Troubled by the tension in his shoulders and the barely concealed pain on his face, I step forward as he walks away.

“F-for what it’s worth, Captain, _I_ think you’re a great captain!” My voice, simpering and girly, grates against my ears.

Li barely glances at me. “Thanks a lot, Hua.”

Captain Li’s words come true after all. The orders come a week later, just as Wei and I are rising for breakfast. Li is standing there with his supervisor Chi Fu, the heralds at attention next to them. His face is as stony as ever, not a touch of the vulnerability from the week before, or even the slight humour he used to display during training. 

“Soldiers,” he calls out to us. “Eat well this morning, because this is your last meal as trainees. At noon we ride for the front.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with this! The third and fourth chapters, although I have them relatively planned out(like the dialogue snippet in the blurb), will probably take me longer to upload as I actually haven't gotten anything prewritten, unlike Chapter 2 which already had about 3,000 words when I uploaded Chapter 1. Don't worry, they are coming! It just might be a few weeks. Apologies if you found this to be a bit of a slow chapter-- it's mainly setup for the third, which is looking to be the longest by far.


	3. A (Boy) Worth Fighting For

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, you know how I said Chapter Three was going to be the longest? Yeah, well, I wasn't kidding. It ended up being so long, in fact, that I had to break it in two, and the first section still ended up being nearly 20,000 words. I've decided to put everything that takes place post-time skip(yes, there's a time skip through ten years of war, I'm sorry) and pre-epilogue into an extra chapter, moving the final chapter count to 5. All the same content is still there minus a few minor scenes I shaved off that the fic is still really long without, so I hope you'll still enjoy it. Thank you for sticking with me!

I go to my tent under the pretext of packing my bags for the long ride ahead, but the moment I open my government-issue trunk and see my father’s worn armour there I fall to my knees in silent shock. It feels like I’ve been brought to tears more times in the past few months than I have in my entire childhood, as if I can only truly begin this new life by washing away the previous. I sit there, my hand still propping up the lid of the trunk, until Zhang Wei comes in and finds me. 

“Ping,” he says softly. “Are you alright?”

The only response I can muster is a slow shake of my head. I hear him let out a sigh and settle on my mat behind me.

“Reasonable enough. I suppose no  _ sane _ man is excited by the idea of marching off to his death, even in the name of the Son of Heaven. It’s not seditious for me to say that, right?”

When his poor attempt at humour goes without reply he continues quietly , “I’m scared, too. Fucking terrified. The only real combat I’ve ever seen were some skirmishes when a group of bandits attacked my village, but at least they were still Han…”

It’s not fear that I feel, exactly — I am too numb for that. Unlike most of the men here I actually chose to put my life on the line, and it was not without some internal struggle that I managed to come to terms with the fact that I would very likely never return home. More than anything I am simply overwhelmed, the rug pulled out from under me and leaving me stumbling in confusion. Just when I have fallen into routine, the cotidian training and the pain that follows almost comfortable in their familiarity, I am yet again being plunged into something wildly unfamiliar. It is just as paralysing as any terror. 

“Leave me for a moment,” I tell Wei without looking back. “Just let me pack my bags. I’ll be right there.”

He makes a soft sound of resignation and leaves me alone. In the quiet darkness of the tent I draw a few deep breaths before pulling the armour from the trunk. I can do this. I  _ must  _ do this. I had my say on the matter when I chose to come here. 

  


The mountains are rocky and slick with ice even in the heat of summer, so our progress is slow. Even the most surefooted of the mountain ponies carrying the bags of supplies stumble once or twice, their handlers scrambling desperately to keep them and our rations from tumbling off the side. It is even harder for the hot-blooded war horses. They shake their heads and stamp with anxiety. Khan, worthy beast that he is, still needs some stern urging to get him around rock falls and over patches of ice. Even through the thick wool of my tunic I feel the cutting wind, and my fingers are stiff at the reins. My comrades to not seem to be faring much better, with the sound chattering teeth practically loud enough to alert the enemy. 

Wei and I started out the trip side by side, Wei making small talk and telling rude jokes to lift my gloomy spirits, but as we headed up into the mountains towards the end of the day and the path narrowed we found ourselves forced apart. Now even the men who had been singing jolly tunes and getting their blood pumped with the prospect of battle have fallen silent, picking their way through the rocks and ice with grim faces. Up ahead the captain sits up tall against the wind. His face is still a mask of determination, eyes facing straight forward as if he can see all the way to our destination from here. It must be a show of strength to keep up morale, because his cheeks are red from the wind and his huge horse struggles to keep its balance. 

Everyone is grateful when we reach a wooded clearing and the captain turns his horse around and orders for us to set up camp. I slide off my horse onto the thin layer of snow, blowing on my frozen fingers in a futile attempt to warm them. The sun is setting fast and if we don’t get a fire going soon I fear I’ll lose them. Wei comes up beside me as we lead our horses to the hitching post that someone hammered into the ground, his nose running from the cold.

“Not exactly glorious, eh?” His smile is thin, an alarming sign from someone so purposefully optimistic as Wei. He must be half frozen. 

I shake my head. “These mountains are nowhere near as high as some of the ones we’ll have to cross near the wall.” Part of me hopes the invaders might push a little farther south, just to spare me the marching it’ll take to go to face them. 

We don’t speak much as we sweep away snow with an evergreen branch and set up our tent — I at first balked at the prospect of having to share a tent, having been lucky there were enough at the training camp to have my own, but the promise of that extra bit of body heat is beginning to sound more and more appealing. After a bit of struggle that leaves us sweating (unfortunate because the feeling of the cold wind against my damp body is so much worse), we get the tent to stand on its own. Wei examines it with grim displeasure.

“Not my greatest work,” he comments.

“As long as I don’t have to sleep in the snow I’m not too concerned with the aesthetics of the whole thing.” I long to crawl inside and lay out my mat right now, but a gong rings to call us to dinner and I hastily shove my pack inside. 

The meal is plain rice with a bit of cabbage, but at least it is hot. Wei and I perch atop some nearby rocks and eat with gusto. Just as I finish and put the bowl down with a clatter, I catch sight of the captain talking to a messenger in a clump of trees. I put a finger to my lips as Wei watches in confusion and crawl across the rocks until I am just above the two.

“...may be sooner than we anticipated.”

“That’s no problem, is it? My f — the general, he can handle these things. We’ll be there in two nights anyway.”

“I have full faith in the general as well, but there are some things we cannot account for, and the men are uneasy. I am sorry to say this, but your troop is not in particularly good standing at the moment. Some are saying that your men aren’t suited for this sort of thing.”

“I don’t believe my father sent you here to dispense gossip, soldier. At dawn tomorrow I want you to ride back and tell him we’ll be there soon and are fully prepared to help face off a party of invaders. He need not worry.” Li’s voice is tight and he seems on the verge of snapping at the messenger, who bows deeply.

“Of course, Captain Li.”

The messenger turns back to camp and the captain stands in silence for a moment, his fists balled. I lean over the edge of the rock I’m crouched on carefully, trying to get a look at the expression on his face, when some of the rock I have my hand on crumbles away. It’s a small enough shard that I expect it to be muffled when it hits the snow below, but instead it hits a tree branch and sends all the snow collected on it down with a thump.

Li turns suddenly, his hand on the hilt of his sword and his face alert.

“Who’s there?” he calls.

I cringe in embarrassment and even some fear, for though I have faith in the captain I have no doubt he will not hesitate to punish me for overstepping my bounds like this. Having no other choice, I get up and scramble down the rocks and bow before him. 

“I am so sorry, Captain. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, it’s just that — “

“Hua Ping.” The captain sighs. “I thought you were an enemy scout.”

I look up to see him drop his hand from his sword and give me a small smile. 

“You really are quite the troublemaker, aren’t you?”

“I — “

He raises a hand. “Save it. Where’s your friend? The handsome one with the loud laugh?”

I pause, as if there could be any other friend he is speaking of, but Li’s description startles me. Zhang Wei? Handsome? It has never really occurred to me, though I know myself to not be free of a woman’s desires. Now that I think of it it is indeed odd that I have only ever seen Wei as a friend, a brother, when he is just as much a man as any of the other soldiers. Yet I have never felt any shame or pause when we sling our arms around each other, and earlier I was considering how nice it would be to have an extra body in my tent for warmth! How far I have come from the blushing maiden of before. 

“Zhang is probably back at the campfire by now,” I reply truthfully. Unlike me he has his priorities straight and is not tempted to go slinking off into the woods in the opposite direction of warmth. 

“Good. I’m surprised you didn’t go with him.” The captain shifts his weight, and if there were more light to see his face by I wonder if I could see discomfort written there. Considering he just caught me spying on him it wouldn’t be unreasonable . 

“I’m sorry, sir,” I say again, now longing to head back to the campfire myself. Why do I always have to be so bumbling in front of the captain? I once promised him I’d be a better soldier, but by now he must think me a complete idiot, and a disobedient one to boot.

“I’m sure. Now, Hua…”

Shang focuses on me for a moment, though I don’t know how he well he can pick out my features in the dark. The awkward silence lies heavy on me, and now I am the one shifting in my boots. Melted snow seeps into my boots. 

“Next time I hope you’ll have the same sense as your friend and not go sneaking after your superior officer,” he says at last, the words escaping from him with a tired breath. I stand hesitantly, as he clearly has more to say, but he turns away. 

“You’re dismissed, soldier.”

I leap at the opportunity, straightening from my partial bow and turning back towards camp. It’s probably my imagination, but as l leave I think I hear the captain swear under his breath.

When I get back Wei is of course sitting by the large cooking fire, sipping lazily on a cup of tea.

“Took you long enough,” he grumbles. “What did you discover on your super duper not questionable snooping that will definitely not get you hanged at some point that has you looking like that?”

“Looking like what?” I shoot back, taking a seat beside him. I’m still caught up with what the captain said to me — that, and what I heard him discussing with the messenger. 

Wei rolls his eyes. “You’ve been all deary and silent since this morning. I totally get why. I nearly shat myself earlier and was sure I was going to either fall or freeze to death on the way up here, but now you look like you’re trying to crack a case. So it’s this about-face you’ve pulled that’s concerning me. What clue have you sniffed out, hunter?”

“That the captain is really damn weird,” I reply.

  
  


The rest of the ride proves much the same as the first day — snow, cold, narrow mountain passes that threaten to send you over at any moment — until on the third morning as we finally make our way out of the mountains and down into the valley where we are supposed to be rallying with the general. Khan is relieved to be walking on relatively stable ground again, and I give him a reassuring pat on the neck as he trots along. Spirits are just beginning to rise again as we pass down into the trees and greenery when the sound of clattering hooves sets us all on our guard. A messenger or a scout, someone on our side at any case, gallops out from the trees and brings his horse to a halt in front of the captain. I am too far away to hear the message that the man delivers, but even at this distance it is easy to catch the moment when the captain goes livid.

He barely wastes a breath telling us to catch up to him later before he urges his horse forward and gallops away. The messenger stays where he is, panting and clearly shocked by the contents of the message he delivered. Around me all of the men have become uneasy, shifting in their saddles and glancing around. Several seem to be considering galloping after the captain. I grip my reins until my knuckles go white. Whatever is ahead of us… My mind goes to the words of the messenger from a few nights before.

_...may be sooner than we anticipated.  _

The troop rides ill at ease through the trees. Even the horses have caught onto the mood and weave anxiously over the muddy ground. As we continue deeper into the valley, it becomes even more clear that something is amiss. On the biting wind I catch a hint of woodsmoke, stronger than the kind coming from an army’s campfire. At last we break through the trees, and the sight before us drains the blood from even the most stoic of the soldiers’ faces. 

The little northern village the general’s troops were supposed to be stationed at is nothing but ash and blackened ruins. A trail of thin black smoke rises from one of the gatehouses, a quietly smouldering skeleton that welcomes us as we ride into town. The clatter of armour and hoofsteps in the churned up mud is deafening against the eerie silence of the place. As I swing myself off of Khan and step forward I come across a doll. It is a tattered thing, clearly well loved by whatever little girl had owned it. Now it lies discarded in the mud. Up ahead the captain’s horse is tied. It glances up at us as we march past, exhausted from the hard ride down. His rider is nowhere to be seen.

It does not take long to find out what happened here. On the far side of the village, beyond a single tattered flag bearing the symbol of the Son of Heaven, there is a great open field still blanketed with a thin veil of mountain fog. A few carrion birds have already begun to circle over head. Strewn across it, as limp and muddy as the little doll, are bodies. Soldiers’ bodies, with armour and gleaming swords fallen beside them, but there is also a great pyre from which a final wisp of smoke rises. The wind stirs the ashes and lifts a few scraps of fluttering fabric, colourful and distinctly civilian. Bile rises in my throat and all I can think about is the owner of the doll. 

There is a loud choking noise beside me, and I turn to see Chien Po, who has buried his head in his giant hands. Even Yao’s sour face has fallen slack with wordless horror. A void seems to have opened up inside me, swallowing me up until I am too empty even for tears. Wei’s fingers grip my wrist, but I cannot bear witness to the terror that I know has consumed him.

One figure still stands on the battlefield. The familiar broad shoulders of Captain Li Shang tremble ever so slightly as he recites a Buddhist prayer to the bloody helmet of the general which he has propped up on a sword. His men stand back, watching at a respectful distance as their captain finishes his prayer and stands in silence. When he at last turns his face is yet again that hard mask. He makes towards us as if he cannot even see us, so I am surprised when he pauses for a moment and glances at us.

“We were too late.”

It is an understatement.

  


We mount again quickly. It is not safe here out in the open among the still smouldering remains, especially when we have no idea how many of the invaders have crossed our borders, so Li marches us up into the mountains again. As much as I dislike the treacherous terrain, it is a relief to finally be out of sight of the bloody battlefield and that horrible pyre. The image of that doll — of the tattered fabric in the breeze — lifeless bodies with blood pooling in the frozen mud around them — no matter how many times I squeeze my eyes shut they still there waiting for me in the darkness. Li orders us to ride in silence in case the killers are still nearby, but nobody needs to be told twice. I feel as if I’ll never be able to speak again. 

A sudden bang shatters the solemn quiet, sending birds from the trees and causing the horses to shriek. Khan shys under me and I pull hard on the reins to keep him from tumbling off of the path. Up front the captain looks back with fury. 

“What the hell happened? You just gave away our position to every Rouran in the damn —” 

An arrow whistles out of the trees and catches him in the shoulder and the line of soldiers instantly explodes into chaos. Men yell and horses buck. All around me there is movement — on the path, among the trees, up on the cliffs above us— and I do not know which way to turn. Flaming arrows fly overhead, coming down on the supply wagons and sending them up with a  _ fwoomph. _ Li is screaming something to us, but my head is spinning and my heart beating right out of my chest.

It is like the fight I got into on the first day. All of my training leaves me with a rush and I am left only with my instincts, urging me to run or to defend myself. But defend myself from what? In all the chaos I still cannot tell which direction they are attacking from, whether they have begun to rush down on us or whether it is only the archers in the trees. I focus on the ground in front of me, trying to drown out the shouts and screams around me. Trying to clear my head.

A supply wagon blows behind me, and I am sent flying off my horse. My jaw cracks against the ground and my palms come up bloodied. There is a sharp pain in my left knee, but at least this sudden sensation is enough to bring me back into the moment. Cannons boom as soldiers fire up at the enemies — so that’s where they are. On the cliffs above us. Far too many to be just a scouting party. No wonder the general’s army was wiped out — there are far more of the bastards than we had ever expected to press this far into the emperor’s lands. This is probably just a single company of a far larger force.

I pick out one man, his eyes watery and jaundice-yellow, who sits tall in his saddle. The leader. My scraped palms curl into fists and I am suddenly filled with a wild anger, something to occupy the space left by that horrible void. The leader smiles down at us. He raises his sword, and the enemy at last swarms down on us.

Burning with new determination, I leap to my feet. As the enemy crashes down on us the air rings with the sound of blade meeting blade. My sword is already drawn and in my hand. My newfound focus draws my eyes to an overhang of ice above where the enemy leader stands, and a simple yet dangerous plan springs to mind. Zhang Wei is just ahead of me, struggling to hold off an enemy soldier who is steadily winning the battle of strength amongst their interlocked swords. I come up behind him, a whirlwind of fury, and knock the man away with the flat of my blade. His eyes lock on mine for a second as he staggers to the edge of the mountain path, before plummeting over the side. Wei regards me with terror.

“Cover my back,” I tell him. “I need to get to that wagon.” I gesture to my goal, an overturned supply wagon with explosives spilling out into the snow. Wei nods, his eyes darkening with determination. 

We fight our way through the fray, swinging and kicking at enemy soldier who stand in our way. At one point Wei blocks a blow that nearly comes down on my head, and I slash across the opponent’s unguarded stomach as Wei engages his sword. Hot blood sprays across my face but I feel none of it. My heart is bent on only one thing. Other soldiers have noticed us making our way towards the cart, and in less extreme circumstances I would be surprised when Yao and Co. step to our aid, clearing the way with a storm of blades. It feels like moving through quicksand, but the whole of our journey must take a little under two minutes. 

I jump up onto the cart, sifting through the explosives until I find one. It is little more than a child’s New Years’ rocket, maybe capable of scaring off the  _ shanxiao  _ but couldn’t take off much more than a few fingers. Whatever the case, it is large enough to serve my purpose. The canons are quickly being overwhelmed and the captain is shouting orders to fall back. I scramble up onto a ledge and draw a matchbox from my belt. The enemy has noticed me and urges his horse forward.

“Hua Ping!” Li yells. “Get down from there!” at the same time that Wei hisses,

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Still, he climbs up beside me and watches as I light the fuse. 

The rocket sails over the leader’s head. I drop the burnt-out match to the ground and watch as it explodes in a flash of gunpowder. Wei stares in horror.

“You missed him!” he moans, tugging his hair. “How the hell could you miss from this close!?”

I am too focused to make a reply, barely hearing Li as he shouts and runs towards us. The rocket has hit the icy overhang. One icicle falls, and then another. The snow on the ledge above trembles slightly. The enemy leader, still approaching, turns to see it and swears in his guttural tongue before kicking his horse and leaping down at them. Wei screams and jumps backwards just as the horse’s hooves come down on us. I roll, the last of the icy focus evaporating as I avoid being trampled to death. 

His blade delivers a glancing blow to my side and I stagger. If not for the haze that battle frenzy has sent me into I would probably collapse, but I manage to regain my balance and raise my sword. Suddenly Li is beside me, and he takes a swing at the mounted Rouran. The man swears again but does not return the attack. His yellowed eyes glance up at the snow above, and with sudden urgency I grab Li’s wrist and jump down from the ledge. Behind us the snow and ice collapses with a mighty thump and begins to pour down the cliff towards us. 

I run as fast as my short legs can manage, dragging the captain behind me. He attempts to free himself, likely none to happy about being pulled along by a lowly recruit, but my mind is focused only on escaping the roaring avalanche behind us and I do not release his wrist. Khan is up ahead, still waiting for me after I had been blown off. I nearly escape the avalanche when I lose my grip on Li as he stumbles. Still caught up in the momentum I’ve built running down I cannot stop and help him up, so I just scramble desperately at the sliding rock before crashing into Khan. Turning wildly I see Li, trying to get up from where he fell, when the snow swallows him like a great wave. It bears down on me and all I can do is clutch Khan’s neck before the white engulfs me too.

  


I burst through the snow gasping for breath, my mouth and nose still partially clogged with packed ice. For a moment I don’t know where I am, surrounded only by white. Then Khan’s black form surges out of the snow next to me. His big brown eyes regard me, and I am then overcome with realisation. I am alive! I survived an avalanche! I give Khan a big hug around his muscular neck before hauling myself up. The mountain pass is unfamiliar now, coated with snow and uprooted trees. Something else niggles at the back of my mind…

“The captain!” I yell, not realising I say it out loud until Khan shakes his neck. Unsure what to do I begin digging frantically at the snow like a dog looking for his bone, coughing as the snow in my mouth melts and sends icy water running down my throat. He’s dead, buried under the blanket of snow — and it’s my fault! My idea to start an avalanche to drive off the party that attacked us! I had thought I was being clever, that perhaps I was a real warrior after all, but it turns out I’m still the bumbling, awkward idiot of a soldier that I’ve been since my first day of training. The captain, who has been so patient with my antics, who barely even chastised me when he caught me snooping, who smiled and told me to go back to bed when he found me foolishly trying to climb that stupid fucking pole — 

My eyes water, both from the cold and the terror welling up in me. I’ve killed my captain. This time I have well and truly fucked up. I’m a stupid, foolish woman who has delluded herself into thinking that she could do a man’s job — that she could  _ be  _ a man — and look where it has gotten me. All the tears that I could not cry for all those poor blackened bodies back in the village, that I fought back during training and felt too numb to shed when we first set out, now come streaming down my face. I sob harder than I did when I learned my father had been drafted, with my hands all the while clawing at the snow around me even as they turn red and then white. 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I mumble, the words I find myself repeating again and again in front of the captain. Khan whinnies, and I look up to see Li sliding down the mountain towards me, unconscious but at least not trapped beneath the snow. I race towards him and pull him up. He’s a dead weight in my arms as I again drag him towards Khan, his head flopping against my chest. An arrow lands in the snow next to Khan and we both start, but when I look around I see Yao standing on a nearby ledge, his face set and a drawn bow in his hands. A rope is tied to the arrow. Shakey from nerves and cold I haul Li onto Khan, tying the rope around the horse before jumping onto the horse too. 

The snow slides beneath us and for a moment I fear we’ve survived the avalanche just to fall over the cliff, until the rope around Khan goes taut. Yao is straining with all his might to keep us from going over. The rope is slipping between his fingers, sure to leave some horrible rope burn, until a hulking form marches up behind him. Chien-Po seises the rope and pulling us forward. I grip it firmly with one hand and steady Li with the other as Chien-Po lifts us from the snow and onto the safety of the cliff. Khan clatters eagerly onto solid ground. He was not a big fan of being hauled up on a rope. 

I breathe a sigh of relief as I slide off of him and pull the comatose captain with me. Ling, who seemed to have no part in his friends’ rescue attempt, comes up towards us with open arms.

“Hua Ping! That was quite the maneuver you pulled back there! You may’ve just saved us from a sore retreat.”

“Whatever the case, your move sent the enemy running,” Yao rumbles. “That general-looking guy and his men are nowhere to be seen.”

I try to smile with chattering teeth, but the relief of standing here with my comrades suddenly melts away and I freeze. Li is here in my arms, but — 

“Where’s Zhang Wei?” 

Ling shrugs. “Sorry, man, I haven’t seen him. A lot of folks are scattered around because of the attack and avalanche and all.”

I swear fiercely, something one becomes accustomed to when living amongst soldiers, and walk past them carrying the captain. Wei’s fine, I tell myself. He can look after himself. In fact he’s probably sitting around here somewhere waiting for me to come back. I just need to make sure the captain is taken care of and then I’ll go look for him.

The men, scattered and disoriented as they are, have set up a makeshift camp on a ledge just above where the invaders attacked us from. Normally it’d be unwise to make camp where we were just attacked, but the troop is in too much disarray at the moment for us to move out. Plus our leader is currently out of commission in my arms and showing no signs of waking. Someone calls out as I make my away into the small circle of tents and wagons ahead of Yao and Co., and suddenly men are coming up to me. I am received with cheers and slaps on the back, those who know my name offering me a small, “You did it, Hua Ping!” It is a wild contrast from those first days of training when all I recieved was dark looks. Turns out stopping an enemy attack and saving the captain does wonders for public relations. 

One of Li’s subordinates, a thin-faced lieutenant or something of the sort, tries to take the captain from me, but I send him off with a harsh order to get a cot and warm clothes ready for his superior. To my relief someone pulls the captain’s tent from one of the supply packs and sets it up. I lay him down on the cot the lieutenant brings, prepared to live him to be dressed and tended to by one of the hovering medics, when his eyelids flutter and he clutches my wrist. 

“Hua Ping,” he says weakly. “Is that you?”

I glance at one of the medics, who seems just as eager as I for me to leave. 

“Yes, Captain,” I reply. 

“What happened?”

“Mr. Hua here saved you!” the lieutenant responds eagerly before I can get a word out. “He saved us all, in fact! The invaders would’ve killed us all if he hadn’t driven them off with that avalanche.”

Li rolls his head to look at me, his lips curling. “Did you really?”

My cheeks burn. “It’s not like that, I promise. I wouldn’t have had to  _ save  _ you if I hadn’t nearly gotten you buried in the avalanche  _ I _ started.”

The captain chuckles softly. “You’re a crazy man, Hua Ping. And for that, I owe you my life.”

I attempt to pull my hand away. Such praise should go to people who are actually competent, not me, who cried like a baby just a few minutes ago. “Captain, you’re all worn out. Let the doctors attend to you.”

“I’m fine,” he insists. His grip is surprisingly strong for someone on the verge of passing out again. “Can’t you stay with me for just a little bit longer? I want to properly thank the man who saved me.”

“I need to change my clothes,” I stammer. “I’m freezing to death and I’m sure you are too.”  _ And I need to go find my friend. The one you said had a loud laugh. The one whose life means a lot more to me than your thanks.  _

Li’s face falls in disappointment. “Alright. If you really don’t want to stay with me. Just know I truly am thankful. You seem not to realise it, Hua, but you’re a good man. A true son of Hua Zhou.”

“I know,” I insist, becoming desperate. I had not lied about the clothes. Too much has happened to me today for me to be able to handle emotional moments like this. I just want to sit by a fire with Wei, not be praised in ways I do not deserve. “I’ll come by to visit you later, okay?” It’s a rash promise, and probably a bit bold to assume that the captain is eager for my company again, but it seems to please him.

“Alright. Go take care of yourself, soldier.”

  


I step out of the captain’s tent into the late afternoon sun. Now that the shock has completely worn off my body is wracked with pain, yet all I can think about is finding Wei. The last time I saw him he was leaping out of the way of that horrible man with the yellow eyes. He had been terrified, sure he was going to die, and all because he had followed me up onto that ledge. My nerves wear thinner and thinner as I search through the tents and wagons and disordered men. When I ask where he might be I’m met with disappointing answers like, “He might be off with the lads trying to recover the buried wagons,” or “There’s a scout party out searching for the invaders. Maybe he’s with them?”

After peering through tent flaps and brushing off excited men trying to congratulate me for what seems like hours, the sun beginning to set over the peak of the highest mountain, I have started to lose any hope of finding my friend. My heart sinks into my stomach as I trudge back towards the main encampment when a familiar voice calls out,

“Ping, you idiot, get over here!”

I turn, brought almost to ears as my spirits soar suddenly, and race towards him. Zhang Wei is lying near the entrance of a medic’s tent, sitting up on his bed roll and glaring at me. His head is so wrapped with bandages he looks like he’s forming a cocoon. 

“Good to see you too!” I reply, struggling to hide my overwhelming relief and excitement. Wei is here and relatively alright! I didn’t fuck up quite so badly after all!

“I don’t care what everyone else says. That batshit plan of yours almost got me killed, you asshole!” he grumbles as I duck into the tent and crouch beside him.

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell everyone,” I confess. I have never been so happy to be called an asshole in my life. “They won’t believe me and keep saying I saved us from the invaders.”

Wei sighs and lays back down on the mat. “You’re unbelievable, Hua Ping.”

“T...Thanks?” I take his hand in mine and squeeze it. Seeing Wei acting normal is enough to make me want to kiss him. Platonically. As a brother. But still. “I was so worried about you, Wei. All I could think about was you and if you were okay. After everything that’s happened today…” 

The words turn to ash in my mouth. There is no way to describe the mix of emotions I have felt today, nor the horrors I have borne witness to. I am suddenly overcome with bone-deep exhaustion that makes me want to flop down beside my friend and never get up again. 

Wei’s hand, previously limp in mine, finally squeezes back. 

“I know,” is all he says. We sit in silence for a moment, together in our pain, until a doctor comes over and ushers me out of the way. Wei bats away the bowl of soup claiming he feels sick. I take that as my cue to leave, saying a brief goodbye before heading up to where the central campfire is burning. After eating a solitary meal of plain rice — several of the food supply carts having been lost either from the attack or the avalanche — I put it into my mind to uphold my promise to the captain. 

The guards stationed in front of his tent regard me suspiciously for a moment until the thin-faced lieutenant steps out in his way to dinner and notices me. 

“Let him in,” he says. “This one’s special.” 

It is an uncomfortably vague statement but they lower their swords nonetheless. When I slip in the captain is lying quietly on his cot. Soft firelight flickers from a brazier hanging above us. The captain’s tent is certainly far more luxurious than the one to two person spaces given to us foot soldiers. There is a water jug and a bronze mirror propped up on one side of the tent, with more furniture probably set up under normal circumstances. I pad quietly across the tarp floor of the tent, hoping not to wake him, but he stirs anyway.

“Hua. You’re back.” He sits up wearily. “Don’t worry about waking me up. I wasn’t asleep.” 

I walk awkwardly over to him and stand, looking down, until he pulls a cushion over and pats it. Now that we are on more of an equal level I can see his face better — the same handsome features as ever, but now carrying a few more shadows and line, as if today has aged him several years.

“You didn’t change your clothes after all.”

I flush and conscientiously grab at the damp front of my tunic. “No. I ended up going and looking for my friend.”

Something flickers across Captain Li’s face, though perhaps it is just the firelight. 

“That Fang fellow? How is he?”

“Zhang is fine, though he did get a bit of a head injury during the avalanche.” 

Li purses his lips. “You two sure are close, And you came to the training camp together if I remember correctly. Old friends?”

I furrow my brows in confusion. When I came here I had expected Li to want to talk more about my deeds today, how he might reward me, et cetera. But here he is again with his fixation on Wei, just like a few nights ago. Is it shock? “No, we met on the way up to the training grounds, actually. He comes from a village a bit south from mine and we ran into each other on the road.”

“I see.” His expression is bland but there’s something to it that bothers me.

“Do you not like Zhang Wei, sir?”

To my surprise Li seems rather flustered by the question. His eyebrows shoot up and he opens his mouth to say something before reconsidering. “I barely know him, soldier. And it would be improper for me as a captain to be forming opinions about my men like that.”

He pushes himself up suddenly, trembling slightly with the effort. I back away slightly, nervous and unsure of what he’ll do next. 

“Hua. Can you get me some water from the jug over there?” His gaze is focused towards his feet. I jump at the chance to momentarily free myself from this strange atmosphere. When I return he seems more focused, accepting the water with a contemplative face.

“Sorry,” he says at last. He glances up at me, his dark eyes bright. “It’s funny that I’m the one saying that now, huh? I’m just a bit shaken up, and I…” Li Shang sighs heavily as something troubled passes over him again. “I just wanted someone here with me while I work through this. My father being dead. Our mission failure. All that.”

I stare at the floor, not wanting to witness this show of vulnerability when I know I am not worthy of it. “My condolences,” I reply blandly. It’s a false move, putting a bandage on a fatal wound, but what else am I supposed to say now? How does one help a man whose father has just been killed and has nearly died himself? Li is silent for a moment before saying, “You’ve always stood out to me, Hua Ping. Do you know why?”

“Er...because I hit a guy on my first day? Because I kept making a fool of myself in front of the whole troop?” Wei always uses jokes when he doesn’t know what to do. Maybe the same will work for me.

“You remind me of myself. When I was fresh out of the academy.” I look up to see Li staring straight at me, face painfully earnest. “A lot of the men thought the only reason I got the position I did was because of my father. And they weren’t entirely wrong, either. My father was the one who appointed me, after all.

Because of this I felt like I had to prove something to everyone. I had to show them that I wasn’t some fussy academy boy who had everything handed to him by his father. So I made a lot of rash decisions, worked myself too hard, made a bit of a fool of myself even at things I knew I could otherwise easily do. I lashed out and got angry. I just desperately didn’t want to be known by my face, or my family name, or the school I went to.”

The captain brushes the hair from his eyes and leans closer to me. My chest tightens and the room seems to close in around us as he continues, “And you know what? People still make comments about my father. The soldiers still call me Private Pretty Boy — don’t think I don’t know that. It still hurts sometimes, to know they don’t have faith in me, but as long as  _ I  _ have faith in me it doesn’t matter. I can try as hard as I can to hold myself to some impossible standard of masculinity and bravery, or I can do what I know is best for our empire. I just need to do my job and lead my men.” 

Li Shang is, in that moment, the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. The dark hair spilling down his shoulders and the way his skin looks golden in the firelight helps, but his expression is what truly stops my heart. A look I’ve never seen on him before is glittering in his eyes — something pure and unadulterated. His father’s death has rubbed him raw and now he’s turning to me to share some of that emotional burden. I’m almost giddy with it, until I catch my reflection in the bronze mirror — my own hair hanging around my shoulders, face still red with cold. A coward and a liar. Li Shang doesn’t know who he’s talking to. 

“I saw that side of me in you on that first day, when you came forward with a split lip. You were just like me, scuffling in a school yard because one of the boys had said something obscene about my father. And I’ll admit, it annoyed me a little bit. One of my new recruits, acting like a child, reminding me of my younger, more vulnerable. But that changed when I saw you on that second night trying to practise. It made me realise you were driven by more than just insecurity, like a village bully. Today just proves it more — you’re a good man Hua, though for some reason you keep trying your hardest to deny it.”

I can’t stand to hear the captain’s gentle words anymore. Like he understands me and my insecurities, knows what drives me. It was a wonderful, breathless moment when he looked at me like that, but I forcefully remind myself that he’ talking to Hua Ping, not me. _ You’re not Hua Ping,  _ I tell myself again and again.  _ The captain would never say these things if he knew the truth about you. _

_ What truth?  _ Another side of me replies.  _ Why can’t you be the man the captain thinks he’s speaking to? You’ve been happy enough being Hua Ping so far. And don’t pretend you haven’t begun to feel like Hua Mulan isn’t there anymore. Deep down you know that she’s gone. _

I struggle with these rising voices inside myself, but now is no time for an identity crisis. Not in front of Li. Swallowing back tears, I kowtow to the captain.

“Thank you so much, captain. I am glad you think so highly of me.”

“Of course. I only hope that you find it within you to come to feel the same way.”

There is an edge to his voice, and I cannot tell if he is talking about me feeling highly about myself or him. I sit up just as he pulls away quickly, as if he has only just know noticed how close we have gotten. This intimacy must’ve been enough for one day.

“Would you like me to come and talk to you again?”

“That would be nice, just maybe… Not like this. It wouldn’t be proper for me to keep having private talks with a footsoldier like this. I really shouldn’t be interacting with you on such a personal level anyway, but my father’s death… I’m a bit out of sorts. Anyway, I hope you’re not offended when I say I can’t keep a common soldier as my friend. Maybe if you were to become an officer, perhaps just a garrison commander, which is not beyond the realm of possibility…”

He won’t turn and look at me. It feels like the night in the woods all over again, but at least this is something I understand. It would be improper for him to fraternise with a common soldier like me, of course. I am suddenly glad of the strict hierarchy of the military, giving me an excuse to stand up and providing me with words when I know not what else to say. 

“Am I dismissed, sir?”

“Yes, soldier. Rest well. You’ve done a lot today.”

I stumble out past the guards and into the cold night air. All around me are the crackling campfires as men stay up late into the night drinking, nerves too worn to fall asleep quite yet. I make my way towards the edge of the firelight when the exhaustion and the pain overtakes me and I collapse.

  


“And don’t let them come near me again, okay?” I tug on the bandage wrapped around my waist from where the enemy’s sword nicked me. An exasperated Wei sits on his bedroll behind me. 

“If it weren’t for  _ them  _ you’d still be lying face down in the snow right now. Gods. You’re like a little kid too afraid to go to the tooth-puller,” he comments. His head is still cocooned in bandages but at least the doctors said his bleeding has stopped. “What’s your big deal about doctors anyway?”

“It’s personal. Just listen to me when I ask you not to let any of them near me, okay? Even if I’m bleeding out.” I turn to face my friend, who regards me with discomfort.

“You’re asking me to let you die because of some weird personal peeve you have,” he says, voice flat. “Alright. Your loss then.” 

His dull eyes remind me that even Wei has his limits. It’s probably best not to bring up such topics when one is still recovering from near death experiences.

“Let’s hope things never come to that,” I reply quickly. Eager to change the topic I say, “The recovery crew said they found a bunch of Rouran bodies buried in the avalanche. Looks like I really did do some good after all.”

“Ah, yes. Killing people. What a wondrous good that is.” Wei crosses his arms. I frown at him.

“You have every right to be bitter about the avalanche, but could you maybe be less of a bitch for once?”

Before Wei can make a reply a doctor comes over to us.

“The captain is called all who can stand to the central camp,” he informs us. “We’re mobilising before sunhigh.”

At the word  _ stand  _ Wei attempts to get to his feet, but I notice him wavering and catch him just in time.

“You nearly had your brains smashed out less than a day ago, Wei. Just stay here and I’ll tell you everything the captain says, alright?” 

He scowls but to my relief lets me lower him to the ground.

“What the captain says. Sure. Didn’t you already speak to him last night? Oh yes, I heard about that. One of the doctors who went to look after the captain was mentioning it. Having a bit of a heart to heart? Or were you two up to something else?” It sounds like he’s trying to make a joke but there’s a hard edge to his tone that snags my attention. Surely Wei doesn’t have as much of a problem as Li seems to have with him? Soldiers can be more tiresome than gossiping wives. 

“Let’s talk about that later,” I tell him, before nodding my thanks to the doctor and leaving, a hand held gingerly to a cut in my side.

  


The captain and his two second-in-commanders stand by the glowing embers of last night’s campfire. Li still looks tired but he has once again put on a straight face for his men, meeting everyone with a steady gaze. When I walk up he gives me a quick nod, the sort a superior officer gives the trooper who saved his life, and nothing more. It’s oddly relieving, knowing last night was just an anomaly, a grieving son looking for someone to talk as he mourned his lost father. I nod back, a loyal soldier who just happened to save his troop and his captain with quick action, who did not at all witness his captain baring his soul. It is nice to have a role to fall back into.

“We can’t just let the rest of those bastards get away,” a soldier is saying. “They’ve already beaten us once on our own territory, and now that they’ve seen us vulnerable they’re sure to attack again.”

Li’s brows furrow slightly but no other sign of frustration crosses his face. “And what do you propose we do, Chen? We’re out here in the mountains alone, no army waiting in the valley to back us up. No one was prepared for the invading army to have pressed so far into the empire already. We have no choice but to go back and regroup with the rest of the Imperial Army back near the capital. Thus we can reorganise ourselves and ensure the safety of the emperor.”

“So you’re just going to let Shan Yu and his hoard wander as they please through  _ our  _ land, Captain?” the old man spits.

“ _ We’re one troop, Chen. The general is dead. We can’t face an entire Rouran army with less than two hundred men.”  _ Li’s teeth are clenched as he leans towards the man. His composure is slipping. The old man takes a deep breath through his nose but must realise he’s lost this argument because he steps down. The Captain looks around at us again.

“I’m proud of how we managed to hold up against that attack back there, but it is foolish to believe that we can hold off an army as we stand now. Don’t think yourself a coward just because we turn back now. It is better that we go back to defend the emperor than throw ourselves pointlessly on the enemy’s sword just to prove a point. I have already sent messengers out to the border patrols and to the imperial advisors. We will stand and face the invaders, just not today.”

There is grumbling from the assembled soldiers but Li’s words ring true. Our force is small and unprepared. Assembling with the rest of the Imperial Army will give us an actual chance of being able to defeat the Rourans, and the officials can appoint someone to fill the space left by the general. Next time the invaders attack they will not have the advantages of numbers or size. My heart thuds at the prospect of a real battle. In a thousand years the gods may withdraw their favour and the Empire might fall, but not whilst I’m still breathing.

  


Not everyone feels stung by our defeat. Zhang Wei, for one, is delighted that we are heading for the Imperial City.

“If getting our asses kicked in a little mountain skirmish is all it takes to convince Li to take us to the emperor then I would’ve suggested we come up here a long time ago,” he crows. This greatly overlooks the fact that if we had come up here earlier then we might’ve been overwhelmed during the battle in the valley just like the general’s troops, but I’m not about to interrupt his happiness by reminding him of such things.

“Speaking of Li,” I mention tentatively, guiding Khan around a stream that has frozen into a cascade of ice. “The other day I meant to talk to you about him.” It’s been two days since we packed up and turned around, heading on a slightly easier route than the one that goes back to the training grounds. The capital only lies about 30 miles southwest to where we spent our days sparring and preparing ourselves for war, ensuring communication with the emperor and his officials is still possible, but this will be our first time joining with the real Imperial Troops and not just a bunch of fresh conscripts. I must admit I feel some of the same excitement as Wei, but my many worries keep me from being as quick to embrace it as him.

“Oh yeah, I forgot about that. You were going to tell me about what happened on that night after the attack?” Wei always brushes back his hair and looks away from me when he tries to feign disinterest. “Li’s certainly keeping his distance from you now, though. He realised what a dumbass you are yet?”

I bite my lip. It’s difficult to find the right words when it feels like steam is about to come pouring out of my ears.

“He just wanted to thank me for saving his life and got a little more emotional than a captain should really be showing to a subordinate. The man had just lost his father, after all. Anyway, that’s not what I wanted to talk about.”

“Oh?” Wei avoids slamming into a tree only due to the prudence of his horse as he examines his fingernails.

“Why were you upset about me talking to the captain?”

A tree branch catches Wei in the face and he’s nearly knocked clean off his horse. 

“Bloody hell! My ears are still ringing from that ding I got in the avalanche and now this? Remind me to offer something to the gods next time you see an altar. I must’ve done something to offend them.”

“ _ Zhang Wei. _ ” I don’t know why this tiny thing has been bothering me. In any other circumstance Wei talking with a touch of bitterness would mean nothing, but my mind had latched onto it and refused to let the matter go. It reminds me too much of the edge that crept into the captain’s voice when he asked me about Wei, so slight I could’ve imagined it.

My friend rubs his sore head. His eyes have gone dark and serious.

“I’m surprised you even remember that. I’d really been placing my bets on you not noticing.”

“Why?” I snap. Suddenly his avoidant behaviour has become too much for me. My heart speeds and I grit my teeth in annoyance. “Tell me what your deal is!”

Wei stares me for a second with evident hurt. He never does seem to know what to do when I get snappish. “You’re gonna think I’m stupid. Probably get mad at me.”

“I’m already mad at you.”

“Clearly.” He presses his lips together. At last, serious Zhang. 

“This is going to sound sort of paranoid, but I don’t like the way the captain looks at you.”

My anger stalls in confusion and for a second all I can do is blink.

“Wha — How does the captain look at me? Not angrily or something, right.”

“No. Not angry at all.” His voice has dropped several octaves. The path narrows before us, and Wei takes that opportunity to go ahead of me. If he wants to hide his face, so be it. I ride Khan close to the haunches of his black mare. I’m not letting this conversation slip away.

“I — Don’t take this the wrong way or anything, Ping, but you know you’re attractive, right? At least to people who are into your type. Not me, but I can see why someone might think you’re handsome. And you’re the son of Hua Zhou! You must’ve had plenty of girls in your village praying to every celestial being that the matchmaker might see your name in their stars.”

“Not really,” I reply in all honesty. Back at home I ended to receive pointed compliments on my behaviour, not my looks. If there were any girls thinking such things they must’ve been a bit confused. “What’re you getting at?”

“Well…” Wei coughs uncomfortably. Silver tongued Zhang Wei, flustered about something? I’m being to wonder if I’m the one who’s slow on the uptake and Wei is just being generous. “Back when I was part of the militia defending my village from those bandits, I shared a tent with these two guys. Nice enough blokes, and I hold nothing against them, but they… Alright, I’m just going to say it. There are some guys that like other guys, okay? As in, they are attracted to them like a man is to his wife. Hopefully.”

“Oh. I…” Suddenly Wei’s refusal to meet my gaze makes sense. Even for soldiers, who talk about all manner of things pertaining what a man might do with his wife — things that used to make me blush but now just tend to leave me slightly uncomfortable, like when I first saw a pregnant woman’s distended belly and felt myself overcome with sudden disgust instead of the respect that was expected of me — this particular topic doesn’t seem to come up that much. 

“I wasn’t really sure if that was a real thing or not.”

“It’s true you don’t see it much out in the sticks,” Wei says. “But apparently it’s fairly common in the cities, or so I’ve heard, so consider this a heads up. Dancing boys and eunuchs and that sort of thing that small town folk don’t like to consider too much. Lush city stuff.”

Dancing boys? If it’s anything like the dancing girls I found painted on a scroll one of my neighbours dropped then I can see why people like my parents might not want to consider it.

“So, if a man loves a man like a wife, and the other man loves him the same way, then who...ends up being the woman?” I ask in confusion, before realising how this might sound and shutting my mouth quickly.

“ _ Gods _ , Ping, don’t ask me stuff like that. Just… to get back to my main point. The captain. The way he looks at you. He went to school in the city.”

“So you think Captain Li Shang harbours...feelings towards me? Even though I’m a man?” I finish for him. These last words come out awkwardly. If Wei’s right and Li really does see me that way, does that mean he really doesn’t think of me as much of a man after all?

This causes me to stiffen and my skin to crawl as if it’s on the wrong body more than anything else. 

“Basically. And here’s where I might be overstepping a bit, but I’ve seen the way you look at  _ him _ , too. Not quite as extreme but still, not particularly subtle.”

I flush. My feelings for Li have never gone beyond the occasional flutter when I notice his good looks, and the curiosity that some of his actions stir in me. The way my chest aches whenever I look to the man that always puts on a strong face and see pain in his eyes. These small things which I have continually repressed, because I have told myself if I want to be a man — I mean, play the convincing part of a man — then I cannot feel that way. The bubbling of feelings followed by a twisting fear and disgust, knowing that my heart is betraying my spirit, my body polluted by that sudden yin outbalancing the yang. I don’t know him well enough to feel much more than that.

“I’m scared, Ping!” 

I snap back to notice Wei turning around on his horse to look at me, his face filled with warning.

“I’m scared you’re going to get involved in something you shouldn’t, or he’s going to try something he shouldn’t. He’s your superior officer! The amount of trouble you could get in, even if it wasn’t your fault….” His eyes plead with me. “You’re my best friend. I couldn’t handle it if something bad happened to you. So there you have it. That’s why I felt uncomfortable that you might be getting close with the captain.”

Warmth spreads through my body and I am yet again reminded of my love for Zhang Wei. 

“It’s… I’m glad that you care so much about me, Wei,” I reply.

“Yeah, whatever.” Disinterest snaps back onto his face. “If we could talk about something else that’d be great.”

“Of course.” Of all the emotions this discussion as provoked in me, one is evident as being the most easy to express at the moment. It’s Wei’s fault for teaching me this lesson. I pluck a stale bun out of my pack, long since inedible, and heft it at a snow-laden branch just over Wei’s head. A perfect hit! Snow dumps down on his unsuspecting head.

“What the fuck, Ping! Was the avalanche not enough for you?”

He turns around and throws a chunk of snow at me but misses miserably.

“Just testing you. And hey, I won’t be mad at you for leaping to conclusion if you take me to some of those dancing boys.”

  
  


When I was a child my father would occasionally speak of the Imperial City and the time he kneeled before the Son of Heaven as a hero of the empire. I had used these stories as a basis of the fantasies I crafted of myself entering the tall gates in a litter made of gold as the people lined the streets and threw flowers as I was carried past. Now, as an adult, I had imagined myself marching through these gates in uniform, returning to pay my respects to the emperor after a long battle. The people would cheer for us in a heroes’ welcome, and I would smile proudly and wave at little children perched on their fathers’ shoulders for a better view.

We do not, to say the least, get a hero’s welcome. Li’s messengers reach the emperor several days before us, and by the time we arrive the news that the Rouran army is within our borders and has already wiped out the forces of General Shang in a vicious surprise attack has already spread through the city. The people that do pay us any mind watch us with looks of fear or disgust. Don’t they understand that it is here, with the emperor, that we can make the most difference? Apparently not. One woman rushes up to a soldier marching in front of me and clutches his sleeve.

“Is it true that we’ve been invaded? Is there really an invading army marching on us?” she wails. The soldier scowls and shakes her free. After that no more civilians come up to so. All for the better, because more weeping and yelling might be just enough to shatter the thin veneer of military professionalism we have plastered on. 

Chi Fu and several officials head off Captain Li just before the gates to the inner city, where the emperor’s palace and the Imperial Army Barracks lie. He’s too far way, and the city too filled with a myriad of noises from bleeting rams to beating drums, for me to pick anything out but they all look distressed. Li slides off his horse and goes to talk with the officials, leaving the rest of the troops sitting awkwardly on their mounts before a mustachioed man and several very heavily armed guards guide us in.

The Imperial Stables are a hundred times the size of the biggest house in my hometown, and twice as luxurious. Stable boys dart among the slack-jawed soldiers, leading our horses into the massive stalls and heaving off the saddles. I balk slightly when a bony little boy takes Khan’s reins from me but he pats the horse affectionately and instructs me to take my belongings from the saddle bags. I do, half in a daze from the opulence around me, before going to stand uneasily beside Zhang Wei. Another attendant skitters up to me and offers to take my baggage from me but I politely decline. I’m not going to let anything else of mine be whisked off into nothingness by these pale-faced little spirits.

“If this is how they keep the horses here I can’t wait to see the barracks,” I mutter to Wei, who is leaning against a stall and eating a lump of sugar which he has stolen from some royal stallion. 

“Oh no, this is much nicer than where we’ll be staying. Here we have some of the finest horses in the empire, bred just for the emperor. I guarantee that stud over there will get a better meal tonight than us country boys.” As if to prove his point he sticks a cube of sugar in his mouth and begins to crunch contemplatively. He’s probably right. The royal dogs likely receive better treatment than a bunch of conscripts. Their lives probably mean more to the emperor too. Far more than the life of that little girl who dropped her doll. My nails dig into the wood of the stall door behind me. Best not to think of such things.

We walk across the grounds where the Imperial Guard are trained, great expanses of flat, sandy earth surrounded by lush gardens and martial arts pavilions from which one can hear the low droning of mantras. I am a fish out of water here in my mud-encrusted armour and my hair limp from days without a wash. It is clear the other men feel the same. Even once a pair of well-groomed Imperial Guards direct Wei and me to the soldiers’ barracks we don’t know what to do except mill about in the hopes that our captain will return with orders. It feels beyond ungrateful to think this after what I’ve been through, but I’d be much more comfortable if I had a staff in my hands right now. Wei, always tuned in to what I’m feeling in that way only close friends are, nudges me into a corner and whispers, “Why don’t we go out?” I blink at him.

“Out where?”

“Into the city, you dumbass? Where else?” 

“Oh...I…” At any other time I would be budding with excitement to explore the city with my friend, but now, as weary and troubled as I am right now, the idea just makes me feel exhausted. “Are we even allowed to go into the city? Surely the emperor doesn’t want his troops just wandering around.”

“Who cares if it’s allowed? You’re not going to have many more chances like this in your life.” Wei grips my arm and stares at me in earnest. “Come on. Let’s go eat some street food. It’ll cheer you up.”

Based on the look in his eyes as he pleads with me it seems like he’s the one who’s more desperate for a pickmeup, but I relent anyway.

“Fine. If we get caught I’m putting it all on you, though.”

Wei’s face cracks into a smile and he pulls away, spinning around in victory with his arms out until he bumps into a passing soldier. The man glares at him and Wei smiles sheepishly back. I sigh and shove past him, dragging Wei behind me. 

“Come on, then. Let’s go before someone notices us lurking around.”

  


We weave our way through a particularly thick patch of ornamental bamboo, sneaking past two groups of Imperial Guards and couple of arguing scholars before catching sight of a gate set into the high hall surrounding the palace grounds. Crouching behind a pair of urns we watch as the bored guard lets in a party of chattering young women, servants or concubines or perhaps both. When a man comes through with a cart of radishes I wait until Wei gives the signal, then we dive past the wheels of the cart and through the cart. I stand to my feet on a shadowy back street. Clearly no one but palace servants returning from completing chores uses this road, as it’s completely empty. Wei and I creep through the shadows until we are out of sight from the wall’s watchtowers, then finally breaking into a run.

The city is beautiful at twilight, shopkeepers just stepping out to light their lanterns and children running past on their way home to bed. We buy a cone of roasted nuts from a toothless street vendor and munch on them as we walk down the roads cut deep with cart tracks and watch the city light up like a field of fireflies. An ugly guilt roils in my stomach at the thought of enjoying myself when fresh wounds still lie bloody on my heart and Wei still stumbles slightly from his head injury, but I cannot help but be washed with relief. Here I am, with my friend by my side. We may be hurt and scarred in more ways than one, but we are still alive, at least until Li finishes his discussions with the officers and emperor’s officials. 

Without much money we can’t do much more than stare at the wares storekeepers have on display or are carrying in for the night. Painted signs promise all sorts of items from hot tea to dried seahorses for ‘restoring male vitality.’ I grimace at that one. As dull as life in my hometown may be, at least you don’t have to deal with sleazy urban fads. I spot a store strung with lanterns that claims to have the best selection of children’s toys in the Empire and instantly think of my little brother. Poor Yao’er. In another world I might be home with him right now, playing Heavenly Martial Heroes with him while Mother pickles cabbages out back. In another world where my father was never conscripted and I would still be Hua Mulan, sitting quietly in the back of the room while Mother and my sister talk to the matchmaker, still thinking that I was happy living like an ornamental vase because I knew of no other option. The sudden transition from homesickness to an unease that makes me feel like my skin doesn’t fit causes me to clutch a startled Wei’s shoulder for support. 

“Get off me, Ping. I can’t support you when my head hurts like this.” He shoves me away just a touch too roughly to be playful. Prepared to give him a proper tongue lashing I jump to my feet, all discomfort gone in the face of my sharp anger, only for the words to die in my mouth when I see three familiar figures illuminated by the light of a nearby street lantern. 

“These noodles taste like shit,” Yao grumbles. “How much were these, Ling? That lady must have ever changed the oil in her pot since she got it.”

“Oh, be quiet, Yao. I won’t buy you anything ever again if you really feel the need to act so ungrateful every time.” Ling plucks a wilted flower from the display of a shop closed for the night and tucks it into his hair. 

“I think they taste fine,” Chien Po, his head knocking into the low roof of one of the storefronts, puts in. “Don’t worry about m — “

Ling puts a hand to his large friend’s mouth to silence him, but it’s too late. We stare at each other from across the darkening street.

“Hua Ping. Zhang Wei. Fancy seeing you here, outside of the barracks. And what you two might be up to at this time of night?” Ling asks, his voice slippery as a snake.

“I was just about to ask you the same thing!” Wei replies with false cheer. “You haven’t gotten lost, have you? It’d be such a shame if the Imperial Guard found out some lowly conscripts had gotten out and were wandering the city if all you were doing was innocently trying to find your way back to the barracks, hmm?” 

The two man glare at each other even as wide smiles stretch across their faces. A woman walking by looks at them both and raises her eyebrows at me. At last Yao clears his throat.

“There’s a group of Imperial Guards heading this way right now. Maybe try to look a bit less suspicious?”

Instantly we turn away from each other and go back to browsing wares. Chien Po strikes up a lively conversation with a homeless man selling crates of bedraggled chickens which somehow turns into a discussion on how best to deal with constipation. I struggle not to look when heavy footsteps and the clanking of armour sound from down the street and eventually pass by. When the sound finally fades away we all let out a sigh of relief. Ling instantly turns on Wei.

“If you  _ dare  _ tell anyone you saw us here I will put a scorpion down your trousers while you sleep,” he hisses.

“Yeah, well, I’ll put a serpent down yours. A serpent who really,  _ really  _ likes to bite snitches who look like their mother laid with a rodent.”

It is not common that I feel any sort of solidarity with Yao, not even now that he has saved my life, but when we make eye contact behind our friends’ backs we share a look of deep suffering.

“Come on,” I suggest to Wei. “There’s not much to do here for a couple of country boys without two bits of copper to rub together. Let’s go back.”

Wei sighs, rubbing his bandaged head. “Fine.”

We start back the way the came, Yao and Co. settling into step beside us. Now that Ling and Wei have made it clear to each other that any mention of this encounter will not go unpunished, they no longer act so inhospitable to each other and after a while actually start to have a normal conversation with each other. I walk behind them, looking around at the tall building and unfamiliar people. Just because the sun has set does not mean the streets are empty — indeed, they seem to be filled with even more unusual characters than when we arrived.

Old crones call out from the shadows, promising miracle cures and fortune telling. A monk walks past us, muttering a prayer. A pretty girl in heavy makeup laughs at a man with one eye telling a joke, and only when she responds do I realise that she is an actor, done up in lady’s finery to play a more convincing heroine. This last one stirs something in me and I think of what Wei said about the city. Does that actor, dressed as he is, ever feel like he is more himself when he is playing a woman? Does he love men like a woman would? Indecent things to consider about a stranger. I stare at my feet, still thinking of the comfort and ease that man exuded as he put a dainty hand to his mouth and laughed. I probably never looked so convincing in my soldier’s uniform. 

My head snaps up again when I hear guttural murmuring coming from my right. I have drifted off from the others and am standing near the entrance of a dark alley. In the darkness I can make out three figures. They are talking in low voices with their heads pressed together like siblings swapping secrets, and there is something sinister in their demeanour that makes my skin prickle. The language is not my mother tongue, not even the slippery version spoken here in the city, nor the one in which the monks say their prayers. My hand goes to my sword hilt, only to clutch at air. 

The men break apart and with a sharp intake of air I duck behind an empty stall by the alley. Peering out from a gap in the planks I watch as three foreign men step out of the alley and look around. They have too much purpose in their stance to be just merchants or tourists, yet something too lithe in the way they step to be soldiers. As they walk away I rise from my hiding place and watch. Two split off and disappear down side alleys, but one walks ahead with silent determination. My blood freezes. He is without a doubt headed straight for the walls of the Inner City.

  


“Ping! Where have you been?” Wei calls out as I run up to them. I skid to a halt and lean on my knees, panting for breath. The others regard me with concern.

“Is something...wrong?” Ling asks.

I take a moment to take my breath before sputtering, “Rourans! Here!”

Wei stares at me in confusion. “What, invaders in the city? How many?”

“Just three. They’re assassins, guys! They’re coming for the emperor!”

There is a long silence as everyone looks at me wide-eyed. 

“What makes you so sure they’re assassins?” Yao asks suspiciously.

I pause. I  _ don’t  _ know that, of course. Seeing three foreigners and assuming they were up to no good might be a bit of a fault in reasoning. But that feeling that ran through me when I saw them step out of the alley was unquestionable. Something had told my soldier’s instincts that whatever those men were planning, it was nothing good.

“They’re not looking to hold a celebration in the emperor’s honour, that’s for sure,” I reply, straightening up. “Come on, we need to hurry.”

Everyone exchanges a look before following after me. 

  


The back streets just at the edge of the Inner City are still relatively empty. Normally even the most desolate streets have a beggar or two on them but the emperor must have ordered them to be chased off like pigeons on a roof. Because of this it is easier to spot the figure that darts through the shadows up ahead. If I were not already on high alert, my blood pounding in my ears, I might not even have noticed it, but now I zero in on it and we trail after it. 

At last we come to the wall of the Inner City and the man halts at its base. The rest of us duck into a side street and watch as the man waits for a few minutes until two most shapes materialise from the shadows. Chien Po nearly gasps until Yao slaps a hand over his mouth as the men pull out ropes and climbing gear, throwing the ropes onto a metal hook at the top of the wall designed to hold a torch. We watch in horrified silence as the men scale the wall and disappear one the other side.

Yao stands to his feet, brows furrowed in determination. 

“We’ve got to warn the Imperial Guard.”

“And let them know we’ve been sneaking around the city? I don’t think so,” Ling snaps back.

“So? Would you rather have to balance a pot on your head for eight hours as punishment for slipping out or let the emperor be murdered?” Yao fires back. 

Yao is right, of course — ideally we should run up to the guards at the gate and let them know something is wrong. Yet my blood is boiling and my spirit swells as I’m filled with the same burning intensity as I was when I decided to fire that rocket.

“Do you really think they’ll believe us if we come up to them and say we saw some assassins?” I ask, staring out at the wall. The others turn to look at me. “If we go to them now they’ll just think we’re making excuses to get off the hook for taking leave without permission. We have to stop those men ourselves, soldiers.”

Wei narrows his eyes. He doesn’t often get like this — contemplative, intense — and seeing it now only serves to stoke my flame ever higher. 

“True that. But even if we manage to get through the gates, the Imperial Guard will cut us down no questions asked if we just go running into the emperor’s palace. Going into the city is dubious enough behaviour, but a common soldier trying to enter the palace is grounds for immediate execution.”

“Thanks for pointing that out, genius,” Ling mutters dryly. “Now what do you propose?”

Wei looks to me as if he’ll find the answer written on my face, and to my surprise his eyes widen with realisation and he snaps his fingers.

“Ping!” he whispers. “Remember those girls we saw going in through the gate?” 

I nod, distracted by the fact that looking on me seems to have made Wei think of girls.

“Nobody’s going to pay too much mind to a couple of concubines going in to give the emperor a good night kiss,” he tells us. “I mean, what harm could a few women do anyway? It’s not like anyone’s going to suspect we’ve got knives tucked up our skirts.”

My mind slowly connects the dots, as if it is afraid to reach the inevitable conclusion. 

“So you...want us to dress up. As girls.” My mouth is dry.

“Gods, Ping, you don’t have to sound quite so disgusted.” Wei throws me a look of irritation. “If you think my plan is so bad then why don’t you tell us what you have in mind?”

I shake my head, my mind tumbling rapidly. “No, it’s fine. You’re right. Girls. Okay.” 

Wei raises his eyebrows at me before turning to look at the others. 

“Alright, guys. I saw a tailor just a few blocks away from here, and there was some store that sells makeup just past it. Do you think you could run and get something in time?”

Yao and Co. nod.

“Then go. There’s no time to waste.”

They dash off down the street like cats from water as Wei and I remain crouched in the shadows.

“I’m sorry for reacting weirdly,” I whisper quickly to my friend, his face is still solemn. Wei glances up at me, expression mild. 

“It’s fine, Ping. I get that it’s uncomfortable. Especially considering that you…” he trails off and makes an unclear gesture in the dark. “It’s not like it’s going to make you any less of a man. Not a dress or your, uh, preferences.”

Even with the fire coursing through me, or perhaps precisely because of it, my cheeks heat up and I am grateful for the darkness. 

“You don’t know how good it is to hear you say that,” I reply, startling myself when my voice cracks slightly. If it won’t make me less of a man in Wei’s eyes… I clench my fist, newfound determination giving me strength. A piece of fabric is not going to tear away everything I’ve worked for, all that I’ve given to save my father and my nation. 

Ling and the others hurry back, clutching the clothes. We accept them quickly, too distracted to consider how the outfits might’ve been obtained. The dresses are simple enough and thankfully loose so we don’t have to remove our clothes, but in combination with the dark and the time that has passed since I last wore a dress I find myself losing precious seconds fumbling with the sash. Chien Po is having an even more difficult time next to me, so I help him out and tuck in the sash with somewhat more ease than first doing it for myself. He seems a little surprised but to my relief knows better than to ask questions at a time like this. After smearing on enough makeup to hide stumble and square jaws, we bustle out of the alley and make our way up to the servants’ gate that Wei and I snuck out of.

  


The same bored guard as before peers through the peephole when Yao knocks.

He must be about to be relieved by the night guard, because he’s clearly expecting to be out of here soon.

“What do you want?” he growls. 

Yao flutters his lashes experimentally before croaking, “Excuse me, sir, but we’re expected in the palace. We are, uh, special guests of the emperor.”

I cringe at Yao’s terrible impersonation of a woman and a bolt of fear pierces my heart when suspicious clouds the guard’s face.

“Look, sir, I don’t mean to be crude, but we’re, uh, entertainers of a certain  _ ilk _ ,” I put in, leaning forward and making no attempt to raise the voice which has become gravelly with months of practise. “Chi Fu, the emperor’s advisor, he invited us to the palace so that the emperor’s court might see an example of our  _ skill. _ If there’s been no news of our arrival then I suspect it is just because the courtiers were being discreet and did not want to provide more gossip fuel for lowly guards and servants such as yourself.”

“Lowly guard?” the man echoes, suspicious turning into discomfort.

Wei glances over at me, catching on to my ploy. His eyes gleam.

“Pardon my companion, sir, she can be a little rude. It’s one of her charms, really, if you’re into that sort of thing. I promise I’m  _ much  _ sweeter.” He leans forward until his powdered nose is nearly brushing the guard’s, who seems to colour in the firelight. “Oh, I see you’re curious. Perhaps I’ll let you have a little taste later, hmmm? But that won’t happen if you don’t let us in, sweetheart. Especially once Advisor Chi Fu finds out you denied him and his fellows of their nightly entertainment. Why, if that happens, I imagine you won’t be tasting much of anything after that. Not with your head on a stake.” 

He smiles, his painted red lips gleaming like blood in the torch light. The guard gulps.

“Well, I’m sorry, ma’am — sir? Didn’t mean it like that. Alright, I’ll open the gate.”

He stands aside and there’s a clanking as he draws out the bolt. The gate swings open and Wei sashays in, running a hand over the man’s waist as he walks past. “Thanks, baby. I’ll see you later.”

Once the guard is out of sight and we’re on our way to the palace, Wei holds up the knife he pickpocketed and we all murmur our appreciation. I watch as he glides forward in his dress. It’s impossible to tell that just a few minutes ago he pulls it on in a dark alley, or that he’s likely never worn one before. I, on the other hand, am beginning to feel claustrophobic in mine. The silk wraps around my legs whenever I take a step forward, shortening my stride and making it impossible to walk quite as quickly as I would like. 

Memories from my childhood, previously lost because I had never had cause to find them important, resurface. The way I used to hate the long red dress my mother gifted me, because it made it impossible to run. My sister, insisting that I looked beautiful in it when I felt like a moth in a cocoon. The silk binding my legs in a way that felt suspiciously intentional. Oh, the small ways in which a woman’s life is made miserable. 

  


Every second we spend is a second the assassins could be running a blade through the emperor, so I only shift nervously as Wei and Ling talk us past palace guards. They somehow convince the guards to direct us to the emperor’s chambers, and we walk as quickly as we can in the long dresses. Wei manages to snatch another blade and Chien Po pulls two decorative swords off the wall. I touch my finger to the edge and am disappointed to find it dull, but at least it is a sword. Finally we come to the guards at the emperor’s chamber door.

“The emperor’s life is in grave danger,” is all Yao says to them before throwing open the door. We run behind him, ignoring the startled protests of the guards. They do not try to stop us, however, when they catch sight of what is happening inside. The three assassins have cornered the emperor, who turns blearily to us as we rush in. One man turns all the way around to stare at us, and in that moment of surprise I rush at him, blade swung back over my head and brought down in a devastating arc.

The assassin recovers and jumps away just in time, but not before the tip of the blade slashes open the front of his shirt and leaves a thin line of crimson. He pulls out his own curved barbarian blade and raises it to face me, but I have momentum and fury on my side. My blade comes down on his with a ringing clash, the force of it driving him backwards again. But now he has recovered from the shock of seeing a furious woman run at him with a ornamental sword, and the moment the impact runs through his arms he slides my blade to one side with his, the sudden give sending me towards him. He smiles at me before turning his blade around and driving it into my stomach. I twist to the side as I fall forward, avoiding catching the whole edge of the blade with my stomach, but sharp pain still seers through me as he manages to swipe me with the very tip. 

Falling past him I pull my blade up again and take a swing at his unprotected neck before using the rest of my momentum to roll away to a safe enough distance in order to recover my stance. He dodges a blow that might’ve slices through his jugular and gets away with losing only the tip of his nose. We both turn to face each other, panting and bleeding.

He growls something in his northern tongue before lunging at me again. I cannot jump out of the way in this dress so I instead have to raise my blade and deflect his strike, taking one hand from the sword and driving it into his stomach. He gasps and I lose ground avoiding the neck blow, unable to parry with only one hand on the hilt of my sword. I suspect whatever he is yelling at me now means something along the lines of ‘bitch.’

His blows come hard and fast, powerful but relying more on determination that technique. Normally I would be at a disadvantage here, a smaller, weaker fighter going up a trained assassin, but I have the psychological edge. I back slowly away, giving him the impression that he’s gaining ground. In another situation, maybe if he wasn’t fighting a crossdressing clown holding some ancestor’s sword who had run in on him in the middle of a mission in which failure was not an option, he might’ve noticed what I am doing. Now, however, he lunges forward, face twisted in rage, focused entirely on gutting me. Assassins are trained for stealth and secrecy, after all, and a man taught to slit the throats of sleeping kings does not have the head for brutal close-quarters combat like this the way an Imperial soldier does.

Just as I parry one of his furious blows I hook one of the massive, hideous vases that is on display by the emperor’s bed with the toe of my boot and kick it into the man’s face. He stumbles back, eyes suddenly unfocused. I seise the opportunity, and with only seconds to spare before he composes himself, drive my sword through his heart. Before blood even has time to run down the blade there is a shout behind me loud enough to rip me from my battle haze. 

Along with the rather sheepish guards from the chamber door, a group of officials have entered the room. One stormy eyed man with a puckered scar running down his face I recognise instantly as Unit Commander Liang Luoyang, one of the most powerful warlords in the empire, and Chi Fu sniveling behind him. For a moment I am so taken in by the sight of this famous man that I forget my defeated but not yet dead opponent. A sharp pain in my belly alerts me to him again, and I turn back to see that in his dying moments he used my sense of victory against me and has driven the tip of his sword a knuckle’s length into the soft flesh by my right hip. He glares at me with empty eyes before slumping to the floor, my blade pulling out of his chest with an unpleasant slurp. 

“What in the name of the gods is all this?” Liang cries. 

Shaking my head to clear it of fog I turn and look at what has happened around me. The emperor is still cowering in terror on his bed, whilst one of the assassins fumes in defeat as Chien Po, his dress torn wide open, keeps him pinned to the floor with his massive backside. Yao stands beside him looking as huffy as ever. Wei and Ling blink innocently at the commander, despite the fact they both have blades trained to the second assassin’s throat.

All eyes turn to me. I stand, not quite sure of whether I should reply or not, my sword dripping with blood. As time passes in silence I become intensely more aware of the hot dampness that is spreading from my stab wound. 

“Well?” Liang glares at us only finally Wei speaks up.

“Most honoured commander, I mean no disrespect when I say we were simply trying to defend the life of the emperor from these assassins.”

The small crowd looks from the two men overpowered by my companions to the dead man at my feet, their gazes heavy.

“I’m afraid that doesn’t explain why you are dressed like half-rate concubines, or who you are to barging into the emperor’s chambers in the middle of the night.” 

Before any of us have any time to respond Chi Fu puts in,

“Pardon the interruption, but if I’m not mistaken the fools under all that face paint are Captain Li’s men.”

Liang grunts in disbelief. “Is that true,  _ duizhu _ Li? Are these men under your command?”

A lump forms in my throat when Li steps forward. He must’ve come straight from whatever war council the military officials had been holding before we blundered in. I avoid his eyes as he observes us in silence.

“Yes, these are my men, Commander Liang” he answers at last, voice low. 

“That one with the blood all over him is Hua Zhou’s eldest son, if you can believe it or not,” Chi Fu informs the commander. 

The warlord turns to the emperor.

“Your Radiance, are you well? These men have not hurt you, have they?” It is unclear whether he is referring to the assassins or us.

“No, no,” cries the emperor. He is smaller and fatter than I expected. Somehow I had imagined someone called the Son of Heaven who ruled with divine right to be a bit more…majestic. Maybe we’ve just caught him at a bad time. “These lot arrived just in time. A minute sooner and the assassins might’ve had their way with me.” He dabs his balding forehead with a handkerchief and a bearded official offers him an arm.

“You must be terribly shaken up, Your Heavenliness. Why don’t we retire to your game room while the intruders are taken care of?” 

“These men should be put to death!” Chi Fu levels an accusing finger at us. “No matter that they stopped the assassins, that is what the Imperial Guard is for. Common soldiers cannot simply waltz into the Imperial Palace, much less barge into the Emperor’s private chambers! Especially dressed like  _ that.”  _ He turns and focuses all his wrath on me now. “And this man has gotten blood all over His Majesty’s floor! Who do you think you are?”

I stare at him open mouthed, too overwhelmed with shock and the spreading pain in my stomach to reply.

Liang waves a hand to silence the spitting little adviser. “It is indeed a complicated issue. In normal circumstances I would not hesitate to send soldiers who intrude so brashly on the emperor’s privacy to the chopping block, even if they had saved the life of the emperor.” His eyes, grey as a rain cloud, bore into me. “But these are not usual times we live in. The Rouran have swarmed our borders and my trusted general is dead. Foreign assassins are making bold attempts on the emperor’s life. 

I admire your resoluteness, soldiers, even if some of the acts it leads you to are beyond foolish.” He steps forward and puts a hand on my shoulder. The blade slips from my hand and clatters to the floor. “Captain Li,” he continues. “Are these men you value?”

I am too busy staring up at Liang’s scarred face to see how my captain reacts, but there is a genuine edge to his voice when he replies, “Yes, commander. It would be a blow to me to see these men sent to the block, especially with the challenges we are about to face. Hua Ping there saved my life and I do not doubt he could save it again.”

It is likely nothing more than a tick, but Liang’s mouth seems to twitch with a slight smile as he peers down at me.

“Very well, then. These men here will walk free, so long as they prove themselves in the battle to come.”

“Yes, sir.” 

Chi Fu’s frustration is almost palpable.

“Commander Liang — “ he begins, his face going red. Liang’s hand slips from my shoulder and he returns to the group of officials standing at the door.

“Don’t worry, man, you’ll have your blood.” He gestures to the two sweating guards. “How is it that five soldier dressed like concubines can protect the emperor better than two trained Imperial Guards? Such incompetence will not be tolerated.” 

As the rest turn and leave, Li stands for a moment. His expression flickers between disbelief and something else, dark and unreadable. 

At last all he says is, “I’ve called you crazy once before, Hua, but I never imagined it was quite to this extent.” He glances briefly at the others. “Do not take the Commander’s generosity for granted. Next time he will not be so lenient, even if you kill the Rouran king himself.” and then he is gone.

  
  


The cold wind whips stray strands of hair against my face as I stand ready on the hilltop. My companions are beside me, shifting uneasily as we wait for the riders to come. The town we are prepared to defend is small, set in a lush valley and surrounded by vast farmland that lies barren this time of year, but come springtime the farmers will be busy cultivating the crops that feed the northernmost of the empire’s major cities. Intel and logic tells us that if the invading army will lay waste to somewhere next it will be this little spot that is the lifeblood of the nation. 

My palm sweats as I grip the pommel of the saber hanging from my side.The wide, open fields and grassy hills are a reprieve from the crowded, cramped Imperial city, which I did not realise made me claustrophobic until I had ridden out of its limits again, but I have no opportunity to appreciate my return to the familiar countryside.

There is much at stake here — defending our farmland, my own life, and assuring the members of the Emperor’s council that even if I am a rulebreaker I am still a valuable soldier. 

A signal goes up from a distant hilltop — enemy soldiers have been spotted. I lean forward and peer out over the landscape but can’t make anything out yet. My stomach is tying itself into knots with anxiety as my mind conjures up memories of the chaos from the skirmish in the mountains, and the sensation of my sword running through that assassin’s chest, over and over again. The wound he delivered me, as well as the one from that Shan Yu, still stings under its tight bandages, but it is just something else to add to the constant backbeat of pain my chest causes me. The memory of killing that man has left far more of a mark. It will get easier, I assure myself, that’s what they all say. And here, now, is my opportunity to practise. My mouth tastes of bile.

At last, coming down from the mountain pass that leads into the valley, I spot the warriors. There is a low rumble of hoofbeats and the clanging of armour as they march on to the town, apparently still unaware of the force that has been awaiting them from the hilltops. They took General Li by surprise, now we will repay them in kind, only we have the advantage of being on our own turf.

The first wave of men passes down below us, and I look out to see the flag unfurling on the opposite hilltop. My heart pounding out of my chest, I draw my saber from its sheath. The blade, sharp as a tiger’s claw, gleams in the sunlight filtering through the cloud cover. A scream tears itself from my throat, an inhuman caterwaul rising up in me as the men around me transform their terror into rage in a cacophony of noise. And then, like a martial hero with the power of the gods running through his veins, I jump down onto the enemies below.

  


The battle passes in a blur of blood and pain and flashing blades, screaming horses and shouting men. I do not know quite where I am or what I am doing, my terrified little body taken over by instinct and muscle memory as energy rushes through me, my brain knowing that without something else to guide my hand I would be gripped with fear and die in an instant. All I can think of is to survive, to keep myself from being gutted and falling away like that man in the emperor’s chambers. 

There are a few sharp moments of clarity — becoming suddenly aware of the stench of blood and bodily fluids that floods my nostrils, the slickness of the ground underneath me as I fight to stay upright and not be trampled into minced meat, or the sensation of heat from an opponent’s body — but this time I do not find myself filled with the clear intensity the gods granted me when I thought to cause that avalanche. My friends are lost in the noise and blood and mud around me, somewhere in the chaos of surging bodies in which I can hardly find myself. By the time I come to my senses, shaking with nerves and exhaustion, I am watching the backs of the enemy as they retreat.

The sword falls from my sweaty hands and I drop down to the ground beside it, my spinning head only partially willing to acknowledge the corpses and groaning wounded around me. Without the heat of the moment to keep me standing I feel like a puppet who has been cut from its strings at the end of a horrifying show. A hand touches my shoulder and I flinch. Wei is looking down at me, a deep scratch on his forehead seeping blood into his eyes. The same heavy silence as when we came across the remains of General Li’s force falls upon us, only this time more worse by the fact that this time we had a hand in it. I rise unsteadily to my feet again, barely remembering to retrieve my sword.

Wei watches me a moment before starting, “Do you — “

I force the words through dry lips. “Go ahead. I’m following.”

He turns, and I am grateful to be left alone again, treading around the fallen as I make my way back to the town with the rest of my troop.

One soldier turns and groans as I step over him. I start. He is young and smooth-faced, so small and fair he cannot be more than fourteen years. He is bleeding from a gash in his side but other than that appears relatively unharmed, and he attempts to rise when he notices me looking at him. I bend down to see if I can offer him a hand up but he bats my hand away.

“I’m fine,” he hisses, his hand clutching the wound. “Go on, soldier.”

My eyes fix on the blood seeping through his fingers and running down his arm.

“You’re not fine. Come on, I’ll help you walk to the medical tent.”

I reach out to wrap an arm around his shoulders but again he recoils, this time with enough force that he nearly trips and falls. 

“No! I don’t need a doctor! A bit of water and a bandage will do. It’s only a flesh wound.” His voice is wavering with obvious pain, and he winces with every step he takes forward.

“A flesh wound that you’ll bleed out from if you don’t get a proper doctor to stitch it up for you,” I insist, grabbing him and slinging his arm around my shoulders. He lets out a hiss but is too weak to push me off again. 

“You’re Hua Ping, aren’t you?” he says. “I’ve heard about you. You were the one who chased off the invaders when they attacked Captain Li’s men, and you saved the emperor!” His voice, high as it is, is reminiscent of a teenage boy talking of his favourite martial hero. I must say, as tired as I am, it gladdens my heart to hear this boy speak of me with such glowing respect. 

“I might’ve saved the emperor, but I made a fool of myself in the act,” I respond softly. He looks at me, wide eyed. When Yao’er is older, will we be like this? “If Unit Commander had had us all put to death for trespassing and trying to do the job of the Imperial Guard right there it would have been justified.”

“But without you the emperor would be dead! Who cares if you breached protocol while you were at it?” he asks, incredulous. I smile, the movement an effort on my drooping face.

“By all appearances, yes, the emperor would’ve died without my intervention. But it would not exactly be wise to shower every soldier with an inflated ego in praise for stepping out of his place. If those guards had been just a bit less hesitant when following us in I would certainly have been executed.”

The boy looks like he has something else to say but instead he just gasps, becoming a dead weight against me as he slumps over in pain. Fear runs through me as I clutch onto him.

“It’s alright, I’ll carry you all the way to the doctor if I have to,” I promise, but his head shoots back up, anxiety overruling pain.

“Please no! Just don’t take me to the doctor, Mr Hua! I’m begging you.”

My chest seises as I think of a conversation I had with Wei, where I made him promise to let me bleed out before he let me be taken to a doctor, who would strip me and unknowingly end my life here just as effectively as a sword. Understanding dawns as I stare at the boy, with his soft voice and his small, soft body. He stares back at me, his dark eyes franic and pained.

“I understand,” I say at last. “I’ll take you back to my tent and get you fixed up. Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me.”

For a second I’m afraid I’ve messed up and should’ve said nothing, because the soldier looks terrified. Then his — her face relaxes.

“Thank you, Mr. Hua. I’m forever in your debt. But why…”

She watches my face, probably noting the same things in my features that I did in hers. Her next words are clear in those big, dark eyes. “Are you like me?” she asks after a moment, and even though I was expecting a shard of ice still pierces my gut. There is a pause as I wet my lips.

“No,” I tell her at last. “I’m not.”

  


I emerge from my tent, wiping the last of the brave little soldier girl’s blood from my hands as I walk towards the center of the camp. A lifetime of practise had not prepared me for the process of stitching up her wound, but she gritted her teeth and bore with me as I fumbled through the operation.

“See?” she had asked when I was done, her hand gripping mine. “A woman can be just as strong as any man. I bet half of the soldiers in my troop would have cried like babies.”

I had ruffled her hair with affection, my heart bursting from that bright look in her eyes, even after a sword and then a needle had gone through her flesh.

“I’m sure they would’ve. Now get some rest. I’ll take you back to your commander when we head out.”

Several townsfolk mill about the edge of the camp, staring at us bloodied soldiers as we march about our business. Unlike the people watching us enter the city in sorrow, however, now their faces are set with grim pride. This time, at least, we have not let the enemy beat us down, and the camp is buzzing with that odd mix of triumph and nerves, with wounds still fresh and fallen friends not yet stiff on the battlefield. Tomorrow morning, before the sun rises and thirst begins to take the injured that do not pass on in the night, we’ll likely have to go out amongst the bodies again and search for our comrades. After that, the rest is up to the rats.

I find Wei sitting with Ling of all people, eating their meal while having a civil conversation.

“So Ping started calling you Yao and Co,” he’s saying. His voice is hoarse and his face steady, but I know him well enough to see when he’s masking trauma with humour.

“ _ Yao  _ and Co.? Why is Yao the only one who’s named? Wouldn’t it make more sense to be  _ Ling  _ and Co.?”

“I don’t know what Ping’s reasoning was. Maybe you can ask him. Oh look, here he is now.”

The two men glance up at me. Ling’s shoulder is bandaged and there are dark circles under his eyes, but as with Wei he seems to have gotten off without any severe injury.

“Captain Li wants to see you,” Wei informs me. There is a subtle warning in his voice. As if I would do anything indecent just after a battle. As if I have the self confidence to try anything with the Captain at any time.

I nod to my friends and step away.

  


Li is sitting at the pop-up desk in his tent, writing out some long report. He looks up when I come in, but his solemn expression does not change. 

“Hua Ping,” he says. “I am glad to see you have pulled through. Sadly, I cannot say the same for some of my officers.”

I notice with sobriety the absence of the rat-faced lieutenant.

“I caught a glimpse of you on the battlefield today,” he continues. “I think Liang will be satisfied that you have proved yourself just as valuable as I knew you could be. Yet again, Hua, you have shown that you truly are the son of Hua Zhou.”

“Thank you,” I reply stiffly, still standing over him.

He takes a deep breath and for a moment he looks twice his age, as if the weight of all the lives he is responsible for have stolen away all his years.

“I have considered the matter, and I have come to a conclusion that you would be the best candidate for this position, seeing as you have proven your loyalty and courage more than once. Hua Ping, if you will accept, I would like to have you as my Detachment Commander. Do you think you could handle such responsibility?”

My breath catches in my throat. Could this be the moment when it all comes true — that my journey of following in my father’s footsteps as a war hero truly begins?

I snap to attention, bowing low to my captain.

“Yes sir! I do believe that I can!” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel silly for calling the previous chapters long, huh? Again, if you've stayed with me all this way, I'm super thankful. This is by far the most lengthy piece I've ever written, and I wrote some pretty long OC Gravity Falls fanfics in middle school(oof). If you've had enough of me and this story at this point I can't blame you, but if you still want to see where this story ends up then the fourth of now five chapters will be up in roughly two- four weeks. It's much shorter than this but I'm kinda drained from working on the same piece for so long and might end up posting some other things in between. Thanks.


	4. Attack at the Wall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back to me completely underestimating how long it will take me to get something done! This chapter is over a month in the making, so I hope it lives up to all of your expectations. Warnings for melodrama, an outing(but hey, it's in the work description), Ping only knowing how to process three (3) emotions, an extended battle scene, and inaccurate geography because I got tired of staring at five different maps of ancient China. And don't worry, I'm still sticking with my chapter name theme. ;)

“This is it, men. If we can crush Shan Yu’s forces here then the Rouran army will finally be too crippled to press our borders.”

I look out over the wall, the wind whipping stray strands of hair across my face. Beyond lies the fringes of the empire, and lurking in the nearby mountains by Jiàngxuě Pass is the last standing enemy force. Lieutenant General Maa shifts uneasily beside me. Maa is viewed as a bit of an eccentric by the other soldiers, known to occasionally wear dresses and refer to himself using the feminine qiè when he feels like it. Despite — or, if I, a similar eccentric, am to be truthful with myself, partially because of —this, I value his insight, for he has a knack for noticing what others might not. 

“You say that as if our victory is a given, General Hua.”

I turn my head to get a better look at him through my good eye.

“This is the last standing enemy force, and we are bringing the might of the Imperial Army down on their heads. Is there any doubt that the outcome will be in our favour? Or perhaps you lack faith in your general?”

Maa lowers his head. 

“No, Honoured General. It is only...we have always had numbers on our side, yet the enemy have held out for all these years. We cut off the demon’s head only to find it has more lurking in the shadows. I cannot help but think Shan Yu will not concede this battle without dealing a devastating blow.”

The other officers around me do not voice their agreement, but it is clear from the looks on their faces that they hold the same reservations. I cannot fault them — the Empire has been at war since before I was even born, and even if we do crush the invaders here it is likely that after they’re done licking their wounds they’ll just come back in a few years, an endless hoard perpetually pressing at our border. Yet I cannot let myself get dragged down into this pessimism. It is not what one looks for in a general, and it is certainly what men look for in General Hua the Unrelenting, the son of Honoured Hua Zhou who clawed his way up from a lowly conscript to a decorated general. 

“That may be so,” I reply, my hand clutching the hilt of my saber. “But that is a price we must be willing to pay, lest we leave Rouran forces lurking in our lands. The hammer must be brought down, with years of peace as our reward.”

Maa bows, and the other officers bob their heads politely.

“Of course, Honoured General, just as you say. I never meant to question your decision, for the gods know your actions are just and good. ”

Even after all these years it is hard for me to stand the simpering. It makes me wince to think that I once did the same, bowing and treading as lightly around my superiors as if I were walking on eggshells. Though it’s not as if I wish for insubordination.

“Rise,  _ TongJun _ Maa. You were only speaking what one would logically be fearing before such a battle.”

He bows again gratefully. I put out a hand to stop him.

“There’s no need for that. Instead, go to your men and see that they are ready. As you said, this battle will be a bloody one, no matter that the odds are in our favourite. They must be prepared for the onslaught when tomorrow they show the last of these worms the power of the Emperor.”

“Yes, sir. Right away, sir.”

Maa heads off towards the camp, leaving me standing with the rest of my officers. They watch me expectantly.

“Go on,” I say. “See that everything is in order. I will be fine retiring to my tent by myself, thank you.”

They scurry off, and at last I am alone. The sun is setting in the west, casting the peaks of the mountains beyond us into deep shadow. The field of grass turns golden in the rays of the setting sun, turning tomorrow’s battlefield into a pond of heavenly light. Somewhere beyond where I can see, the other half of the Imperial Army prepares to drive the Rourans from the mountains and into that field, where we will finally make sure Shan Yu’s army is destroyed. None of this is a secret to the Rouran forces. They know they have been beaten, that our far larger force has them outmaneuvered. The reason they ever took refuge up in those hills was because we smashed their other forces in prior battles over the last decades, and they are simply biding the last of their time. 

I have no fears that we will lose, not as a whole, anyway, but Maa is right. Fighting against a man for more than a decade can tell you a lot about him, and at this point I’ve learned more than enough about Shan Yu to know that he will make our victory as painful as possible.

A sudden melancholy floods me as I watch the sunset from atop the wall built by my ancestors. Once this battle is done, if the enemy truly is defeated, then what will there be left for me? If history is any sort of indicator, the barbarians will rise again, but it might not be until I am withered and trembling like my dear father. 

Without a war to wage, who am I? The others had lives before all this — families, wives, jobs, something to return to once all this is done? Me? After all these years there is no doubt in my mind that Hua Mulan is dead, if she were ever someone at all. I killed my future when I burnt my womb from my body with a wise woman’s potion and bound my chest until my ribs became a mass of bruises. There is nothing for me to return to. Even my parents, whom I miss dearly and who wished me well on this endeavour, are not an option. After all, I am not their daughter. I am General Hua the Relentless. Perhaps the best thing I can do in the coming battle is die. At least then I will be remembered as the man I have made myself into, and not the girl I sometimes doubt I ever was.

There is a messenger waiting by my tent, kept back by the guards. He bows deeply.

“General Hua. A letter for you, sir.”

I take it without question, assuming it to be a missive from another officer, perhaps Unit Commander Liang himself. What I see instead is the seal of a familiar house. I dismiss the messenger without another word and push inside my tent. The oil lamp at my field desk is out, and I move so quickly to light it that I nearly burn myself in the process. When everything is at last in order, I set the letter down and break the seal.

_ Dear General Flower Pot, _

_ I hope this finds you before your great battle. I had to pay a fortune to find a runner willing to deliver this to the front, what with the actual military ones insisting that they would only take messages about ‘official military matters only.’ At last I managed to bribe one of them, but it’ll still be a surprise to me if this ever reaches you. _

_ Anyway! I heard the news from Ling. Obviously I don’t have any worries about your success, because you’re General Flower Pot the Unbelievable! But still, I pray the gods will hold you in their favour and send you back missing no more pieces than you already are, because I can tell ya, missing limbs are no laughing matter. It makes even relieving yourself seem like an ordeal. _

_ Moving on. Mei sends her greetings, and wants you to know Da Ping is doing well. He’s quite a fat little thing, but she assures me that that’s normal. He never stops smiling, either! Maybe someone could take a hint. When you’re done up there you’ll have to come and see him. Once this war is over we can finally all go on a trip to the Imperial City that you and I talked about. You know, so we can actually get the full civilian experience, though now that I have Mei I suppose we’ll have to skip out on the pleasure houses. Or maybe you wouldn’t be into that kind of thing anyway.  _

_ Hey, you should invite General Li on our trip! I hear there’s a special teahouse in the Imperial City that caters especially to guys with that sort of leaning, if you ever develop the gall to do that kind of stuff. It will never not be funny to me that you would have an easier time killing a man than kissing him. Never stop being you, Flower Pot. _

_ Sorry for rambling, I guess. I’m running out of paper now so all I have left to say is I miss you, man. Please come back to us soon. _

_ May the Gods Bestow Their Heavenly Blessings Upon You, So That You Do Not Die or Something,  _

_ Zhang Wei.  _

Even if I had been walking on a dangerous edge just a few moments ago, I now find my heart expanding just as painfully but with an entirely different emotion. Wei is just as talkative in his letters from home as he was when we were fighting side by side. He did not allow the years, our differing ranks, nor even a spinal injury that left his right leg completely paralysed to come between us. It is having a stubborn friend like Wei, who will bribe a messenger to send you a letter before the most decisive battle in a decade-long war, that has kept me going this long. Him, and of course — 

“Commander Li to see you, sir.”

Maa stands in the entrance to my tent, lifting up the flap. 

I crush the letter in my hand, my chest again constricting.

“See him in.”

Maa bows and is replaced by the figure of a man I have gotten to know well over the decade. Li Shang smiles at me, but his eyes are tinged with the deep concern of a man who knows he will have to lead thousands into bloodshed tomorrow.

“I hope this is not a face you show to your men, Ping.”

My mouth drops open as I search for the right words. Li has the irksome ability to always catch me off guard, no matter how much I prepare myself for him. Not even after eleven years of knowing each other, and ten years of friendship.

“W — What face? I’m not making a face!” I sound like a child, so instead of embarrassing myself further I bite my lip and let him sit across from me.

“You’re on the verge of tears, Hua. Not very becoming of the Relentless General.”

He eyes the crumpled letter in my hand, eyes instantly gleaming with recognition when he sees the seal of the house of Chin, Mei’s family and Wei’s in-laws.

“I’m not even going to ask how that bastard managed to get a letter all the way out here.”

I toss the offending item away, glaring at my friend.

“It’s been years, Li. Do you really still have to maintain this petty jealousy? I haven’t even seen him since the Battle at the Clifftop.”

“It’s been years, yet you still refuse to call me Shang unless we’re on leave.”

He raises an eyebrow at me and I go red. 

It’s been years, yet my infatuation with Commander Li Shang only seems to grow deeper with each one. It doesn’t help that there have been moments, shy touches and soft looks, when I know he feels the same way. The gods can be cruel.

“You’re my commander,” I tell him awkwardly. “It would by weird to go around calling Honoured Liang by his first name, wouldn’t it?”

Li — who, I must admit, I often think of as Shang when I am alone with my thoughts — looks disappointed. This is not the first time we have had this conversation, and it will likely not be the last. He pushes closer, and I, knowing that this can never go forward, back away. I hide behind rank and title, and when that is not enough, my country origins. Despite the constant reminders of my situation, like the bindings currently tight against my ribs, after years of being seen and treated as the person I have cultivated myself into it is still possible to forget.

Noticing the fall in his features, I square my shoulders and ask, “Why did you come here? Surely not just for casual conversation.”

Li sighs heavily.

“No. Conversation, yes, but certainly not casual.” His cheekbones are pronounced in the lantern light, almost unhealthily so. Years of war have not been kind on him, and he bears the marks on his face as surely as I do with my one eye. Being a common soldier and watching men die around you is bad enough. Being an officer and watching men die  _ because  _ of you is even worse.

“I cannot help but have uneasy thoughts about tomorrow.”

The lamp on my desk lets out a gentle hiss of burning oil. I swallow, eye fixed on the dark eyes of my commander. 

“To be clear, I am as assured in our victory as the rest of the officers. Liang’s troops are highly trained and have plenty of experience fighting in mountains, so they will doubtless drive Shan Yu’s men from Jiàngxuě Pass and press them to the wall, and we’ve been preparing ourselves over here for weeks, yet…”

“It seems too easy for what could be the final battle of this war,” I finish for him. “There is no way we’ll be able to walk away from this unshaken. There must be some final axe waiting to come down on us.”

He nods. 

“Exactly. No wars are easy, and this one certainly hasn’t been. Not even our victories have come without personal loses. You would know.”

Shang’s gaze darts to my eyepatch. The scar tissue underneath seems to throb, though it has been four years since the doctors pulled the remains of my collapsed eye from its socket with hot tongs. 

My tunic bunches in my hands. There is always discontent before a battle, even a minor one, but for first my trusted lieutenant general and now my commander to confess their worries to me… Surely there is some meaning in this. Perhaps the gods are sending me a sign that I will meet my end at the wall after all. Now, with Shang’s eyes filled with such painful earnest, the thought seems much more overwhelming than the casual detachment I felt earlier. 

He opens his mouth to speak, considering his next words carefully before saying, 

“I’m worried about you.”

So there it is. 

“Any particular reason? I’ve fought beside you for twelve years, Li, yet never have you found cause to come to my tent and voice your concerns to me like this?”

I try to keep my voice steady, to be the unruffled general I ought to be in this moment. Not a superstitious grandmother, seeing portents in perfectly reasonable behaviour, and certainly not a giddy schoolboy, deriving a twisted satisfaction from knowing that Shang still cares this deeply for me, even after my best attempts to keep him at arms’ length. 

“Nothing more than a bad feeling,” he confesses, scratching the back of his head. “But this is our last hurrah, Ping. I’ve managed to hold on to you for this long, against all odds, and to think when this is all over and we both make it out, then we have the whole future ahead of us... I do not feel as if I deserve to have my luck run that far.”

My tongue seems to swell in my mouth at the emotion in his voice.

“We all feel that way,” I reply dully, wishing I could confess to him the way he does to me. “Don’t think yourself special for it. If all you’ve come here to do is express your sentimentalities, then I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave. I would like to be properly rested for tomorrow.”

“Ping — “ he protests, and I conceal a guilty flinch at the hurt blossoming on his face. 

“Don’t get the wrong impression,” I blurt. “You’re my dearest friend, and there is not a day that goes by in this miserable war where I do not fear for you also. It’s just — just — I can’t handle this, not right now, not with such a paramount event looming on the horizon. I know you’re in turmoil, we all are, and now — I just don’t have the strength to shoulder both our fears.”

I let out a shuddering breath as the last of the words escape my lips.

Shang stares at me, wide eyed. “I’m sorry. I see now that you are just as overwhelmed as the rest of us. It was self-centred of me not to see it earlier.”

He stands abruptly and turns away from me.

“Good night, Hua Ping. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Good night, Commander. May you rest well.”

The hours of waiting for the blast of Commander Liang’s horn seem to stretch on forever. My hands sweat as I clutch the reins, walking my horse back and forth in front of my men as I watch my officers prepare them. Archers line the tops of the wall ahead of us, stringing bows and readying themselves for raining hell down onto the enemy troops, before we lead the foot soldiers and cavalry around the wall to crush them for good. Fengfeng, my new steed now that Khan is spending his twilight years eating sweet hay in the Imperial Stables, picks up on the tension. She weaves slightly as she walks, but she is far too well trained to act afraid. I pat her reassuringly on the neck.

Lieutenant General Maa joins me at the front and dips his head respectfully.

“All is prepared, Honoured General Hua.”

I nod in acknowledgement. There is not much more to say.

I catch a glimpse of Shang at the top of the wall, overseeing the archers. He glances over his shoulder and I avert my eyes before he notices me looking.

At last, distant and ominous, the warlord’s horn sounds. He is driving the last of Shan Yu’s men through Jiàngxuě Pass, and soon it will be upon us to face them off at the wall. As I shift Fengfeng I strain my ears for the sound of the approaching force. Soon it comes, a thundering of hooves and heavy boots, the clattering of heavy leather and iron armour. Liang’s horn blasts again, and Li gestures to the archers. They draw back their bows, muscles straining. 

He says something to an officer beside him, who turns and yells to the lieutenant a ways down the wall from him. In this way, the message travels to the men stationed all the way on the other side of the wall. I anticipate what the order will be before the flags even go up, so I turn back to my men.

“The moment the archers unleash the fifth volley, we’re on!”

Just as interacting with one's own troops is drastically different as an officer, battle is entirely different as well. Sure, you have the same basics of sword swinging and spear stabbing, using the calm and precision honed from hours of practising the martial arts to keep yourself from being swept up by the tide, but as an officer I have so much more to worry about than my own head. Even as I drive Fengfeng forward, cutting down any soldiers who dare face me, I look to my officers, making sure we’re holding position and not straying too close to friendly fire. The brilliant metal of my plate armour and the red plume of my helmet makes me visible to my men, but it also makes me a clear target for the enemy. Another thing about how combat has changed for me — before, I was just some expendable grunt that just happened to be in the way. Something to be dealt with, but not anything more than a nameless face. Now everyone wants to claim the head of General Hua the Unrelentleing for his own. 

Even as the last scraps of the invading force, Shan Yu’s men fight well. The Rouran are fast on horseback, far more maneuverable than the bulky Imperial Army, and skilled with bows, but the very same maneuverability that has allowed them to match far stronger forces is lost here, and bows are useless in such close quarters .Still, like a cornered animal that has known it has no way out for days now, they lash out with ferocity. Fengfeng’s powerful body parts the tide of men and horses, and I tie the reins to the saddle horn to pull my  _ chuí  _ from its sheath. It is a heavy weapon, one that took a smaller person like me hours to wield properly, but nothing smashes through an opponent on horseback’s helmet quite like a  _ chuí  _ does. 

A rider attempts to rope me and pull me from my horse, so for a moment I pass the mace to my left hand as I draw a dagger from my belt. I slash through the rope before driving the blade into the eye of the man who threw the rope. I yank the knife out and he tumbles backwards, sliding from the saddle and onto the ground, where he is trampled beneath the hooves of the horses. 

Even as I slide the blade back into place and take up the _chuí_ again, I take a steadying breath and concentrate on focusing myself. Fengfeng charges onwards, responding to the lightest touch. Near me, one of my soldiers is caught by a rope, and is dragged onto the enemy’s waiting blade. At such close range, it is easy to bury the knife in the unprotected skin of his neck. I watch, oddly captivated, until a blade hits my armour and a shockwave reverberates through my body. I glance back briefly to see the enemy cut down by an Imperial soldier with a sword. Throwing ropes is not so efficient in the midst of a melee, after all.

Throughout the carnage, blood spattering across my armour and blades coming at me from all sides, I struggle to stay as present and aware as possible. It is my duty as general to not let the rush take me, to let neither fear nor bloodlust cloud my judgement. Felling yet another enemy, I raise my weapon and let out a rousing cry that leaves my throat feeling raw. Those nearest to me hear their general and do the same, roaring in the faces of the invaders. They may come in their waves, again and again, but right here and right now there is no time for contemplation. 

I break through and suddenly see the man himself. Shan Yu looks much as he did when I first saw him, on the distant day I caused an avalanche and started my reputation. His eyes, yellowed and watery with disease, do not look as if they should be able to see anything, yet the moment I catch sight of him he turns and pins me in place with just a look. I falter for a moment, and some ambitious fool takes that as an opportunity to drive his sword into my side. It doesn’t go through my armour, of course, but the force of it is enough to nearly knock me from my horse. I catch myself just in time, though the hefty  _ chuí  _ slips from my hands and is lost below. To try to go down for it now would be pointless. By the time I right myself, Shan Yu is gone.

As I rally my men, crashing into the midst of the enemy and hacking my way out, the sun rises high in the sky, catching on armour and blades with a flash of brilliance. It is my only way of judging how long this goes on, as the blood-soaked faces and weapons of the men around me blend into one. After losing my mace I pull out my  _ dao  _ to begin slashing, and it doesn’t take long for the motion of my arm to feel reflexive. It is the kind of numbness that keeps a man whose whole career is built on killing others from going mad. I run through the motions that I have performed a thousand times before, the routine of it only interrupted when some attack I fail to block rattles my brain inside of my skull or nearly sending me tumbling.

It is clear the tide is in our favour, as it was from the start. Shan Yu’s men cannot break through the lines of Imperial Soldiers coming at them from three sides, and they cannot move forward without being pinned to the wall and picked out by archers above. Sooner or later they must either make some last desperate attempt or surrender. My judgement turns out to be right.

I’m not sure how,, over all the noise around me, the screams of dying and angry men, the clatter of iron, I still manage to single one out. Perhaps after all these years of chasing after him has given me some connection to him, so when Shan Yu calls out to some of his men amidst the chaos, my ears immediately perk. I urge Fengfeng to turn and she rears, bringing her front hooves down on the man I have just knocked over. Looking out over the battle I manage to catch a glimpse of the man I have been hunting all these years, when I never should have been able to find his face again in all this. Several of his soldiers make their way towards him. Around me, the other Rouran have begun to move, working towards the far side of the battlefield and away from the center of the wall. 

There is an explosion up on the wall. A bright light flashes, then suddenly rubble and screaming men come tumbling down. None of our foot soldiers and cavalry are positioned directly beneath the archers, for obvious reasons, but I realise with horror that the purpose of the explosion was not destruction. It is the simplest of tactics, but that the invaders might have knowledge of combustibles when the empire itself still barely understands them was not something we had ever taken into consideration. Besides, it’s hard to look away from any sort of explosion. As the Imperial Army freezes, the slowly regrouping enemy force makes a break for it. They crash against the startled men on the far side of the field, knocking down first the cavalrymen and then the assembled foot-soldiers. 

My heart races in my chest as I reign in the spooked Fengfeng. It is not as if we came totally unprepared for this…

“Ride their tails!” I scream to my men. “Stab them in the back if you have to. Just don’t let them break that line!”

Everyone leaps back into action, chasing down the fleeing enemy. Yet something else grabs my attention. As the bulk of the opposing force goes one way, one group peels off to the side, like a swimmer escaping a riptide. They take advantage of the moment’s hesitation caused by the explosion and then by the sudden maneuvering of the men, but even when that affect wears off they manage to hold their own with skill alone. Before long they are free, finally putting enough distance between them and us to make use of their speed and archery. Several soldiers start to break off and follow them, unsure whether they have permission to leave their positions. Only one man could break through a line of twenty cavalrymen with seven. My chest contracts and my vision narrows until the distant figure of Shan Yu is all I can see. I turn to Maa, who has been fighting bravely beside me. He does not blink when I order him to handle our men. Anyone who has heard of General Hua the Relentless knows his spirit to be an impulsive and fiery one — something that I haven’t been able to grow out of from my first day as a trainee, apparently. With that I spur Fengfeng on, riding as hard as I can after the man I have been wanting to kill for a third of my life. I cannot let him escape, and I cannot let anyone else have the satisfaction of taking his head.

Fengfeng is one of the finest horses from the Emperor’s stables, muscular and as strong as an ox. She carries me through the bloodiest of melee combat with ease, so she makes quick progress across the battlefield. But once I reach the outer line of Imperial soldiers, who part wide eyed to let me charge through their ranks, and pass into the open space that leads up to the snow-capped mountains, her weaknesses arise.

The bulging muscles of a warhorse may make them capable of carrying heavy armour on long marches, but their bodies are not built for speed. Fengfeng thunders along, her dark neck damp with sweat, but at this rate we will never catch up to the enemy. Shan Yu’s bodyguards, if that’s what they are, turn back in their saddles and notice me coming after them. They do not seem troubled. Here, everything is in their favour.

Two draw their bows, aiming at me with frightening steadiness despite the fact that they are sitting twisted in the saddle of a galloping horse. Their aim is excellent too, as I nearly take an arrow through the visor of my helmet. I manage to duck in time, the arrowhead taking out my red plume, but the second brushes against Fengfeng’s flank. It only takes a bit of skin along with it, yet Fengfeng’s cry and the sensation of the arrow rushing past makes my breath catch. I urge my mount to the side, weaving after the archers. It loses us time, but better that than have my poor girl take an arrow to the side. If that happens, there’s not even the slightest possibility of me catching these bastards.

Fengfeng’s hoofbeats ring out as I pursue the men across the field and to the foot of the mountain, maneuvering around arrows the whole while. Shan Yu glances back at me, diseased eyes wild, and urges his horse onto a winding mountain path. Far too narrow for him to have led his troops down, but perfect as a quick escape route. As the others scamper up the hill, Fengfeng beings to flag. Usually she loves the challenge of racing up a slope, but not after hours of combat and a hot-blooded chase. The path is only wide enough for single-file now, and I have nowhere to go to avoid the arrows. Fear clouds my logic as another glances off my shoulder with enough force to cause a spray of sparks.

None of the weapons I brought — my saber, dagger, and unfortunately no longer my mace — would be able to take out my enemies from a distance, so that is not an option. If I cannot find a way to close the gap between us all, I’ll have more to worry about than not being able to finish them off. But Fengfeng is going as hard as she can on this uneven terrain, so how…? An idea hits me. It is a dangerous one, but it’s not as if I have any safer options.

I leave it to Fengfeng to navigate the turns as we ride ever farther into the mountains and reach awkwardly for the strap holding my chest plate on. After some uncomfortable contortions I manage to undo it and pull it free, flinging it off the side of the path. It clatters down the steep incline. The plated skirt goes next, then my heavy boots, until I’m riding in just my rawhide lamellar armour, with the exception of my helmet and arm braces. There is a noticeable change in Fengfeng’s speed as I toss aside the excess weight. I hunker over her shoulder in the way I’ve seen the riders do in horse races. My enemy glances back as I bare myself to them, not missing the opportunity to notch their bows. I knock an arrow aside with my iron bracer and squeeze Fengfeng’s sides as I draw out my saber. 

The first man seems as if he is still trying to come to terms with the fact that I’ve caught up with them when I hurl my dagger into his visor. It’s not a throwing knife so it doesn’t quite hit its mark, but it still slices across the soft flesh around his right eye. He screams and yanks on the reigns of his horse, which rears as Fengfeng nips viciously at its hindquarters. The horse loses its footing on a plate of loose shale and staggers off of the path, sliding out of our way. I don’t look to see what fate awaits them as I go for the next one. He starts to notch an arrow, but he slowed to watch his companion and I’m already upon him. Fengfeng shoves bodily past him and I break his bow with my saber, then with the same move cut through the strap of his quiver and snatch it up as he is forced over the side with a little help from a well-aimed kick. 

Two down, five to go. I hurl arrows like darts at the back legs of the horse I’m coming in on, managing to scrape some important bits even if my throwing arm has a fraction of the power of a bow. The horse slows, and I stand up on Fengfeng to make the jump into the next saddle. It’s easier in socked feet than it would have been in my military boots, and I spring lightly behind the rider, quickly crouching and drawing my blade across his throat. I toss his body aside the same way I did the armour. The horse is clearly disconcerted by this new rider, but it responds to my heels nonetheless. 

The next man is ready when I try to shove past on the inside. He reaches back with a blade in hand, prepared to bury it to the hilt in my newly acquired ride’s neck without even turning around. He nearly succeeds, but I let myself fall forward from my crouch and use my momentum to drive my saber through his hand. The man snarls in pain and anger, before shoving his horse into mine, slamming him against the rocky outcropping to my left. I snarl back, blood pounding in my ears as I yank my sword from his hand. 

He pulls a sword of his own, and we exchange blows for a few seconds. I am made clumsy by the energy rushing through my veins, my tunnel vision preventing me from seeing his next move before it is too late, and he gets in a slash across my chest. The cords holding the scales of rawhide together snap, and the blow carries enough power that I’m left with the slightest scratch by my collarbone.

His oversight proves greater than mine, however, when he fails to notice the thin branch of a scraggly mountain pine hanging over the path, so focused is he on taking me down. 

The branch doesn’t even stun him, but it only takes a moment for me to lunge forward and part the flesh exposed just below where his helmet ties.  _ A favour sent by the gods _ , I think as his blood splashes across my face, my body still thrumming with purpose.  _ Best to put a celestial gift to good use.  _

I dispatch of the rest of Shan Yu’s bodyguards in a similar manner, until it is just him and me on that mountain path. My desire to kill him, to end this war that has cost me countless men and my own right eye, courses through me with every beat of my heart. After what feels like an eternity spent racing behind him and never quite catching up, the path widens enough to accommodate maybe four horses and Shan Yu reigns his in to a halt. I can barely get my own to stop, skidding to an untidy halt several  _ bu  _ away from him. My mouth hangs open as I pant raggedly, more out of wild bloodlust than actual breathlessness. As I stare into those disgusting yellow eyes with only my one, all I can think of is how much I want him to die — how much I want to kill him, to decorate his throat with a ribbon of crimson like I did with his guard. My hand is partially shaking in anticipation as I clutch the hilt of my saber. 

“General Hua,” he says at last, in a heavily accented Northern dialect only barely understandable to me. “I am not surprised that you were the one to follow us.”

“So you speak our tongue,” I fire back with contempt. How  _ dare  _ he stand there and speak to me like this, as if we are simply here to chat. “Clever trick for a worm, but even if you were to begin to recite the  _ Qieyun  _ itself it would not dissuade me from taking your head.”

He grunts, and for a moment I wonder if he can even understand what I’m saying.

“You have always been a confident little thing,” he replies at last. “Or perhaps just foolish. I have not forgotten the first time I laid eyes on you, during your little stunt with the avalanche. How much you have changed since then.”

“A decade of war will do that to a man,” I spit out, the scar tissue of my eye already throbbing at the thought of it. “Though I can’t say you look any different. You’re just as ugly as ever.”

Shan Yu laughs. “Alright then, clever little soldier boy. Let us see if your wits match your sword.”

He draws his own, a wicked, curved thing that winks at me through the dusk. My horse twitches underneath me and I wish I were back on Fengfeng as I walk it slowly up the incline towards him. A river rushes down below us, the only sound up here aside from our heavy breathing. My saber drips blood as I slowly approach my nemesis. This is it, the moment that will decide everything. If I can end this here, then I will have accomplished everything I have set out to do. My life will be complete. 

The first union of our blades jolts me backwards in the saddle, my horse dancing away. Shan Yu swings again, not letting me have a moment’s rest, and I find myself backing away from his flurry of blows. His sword should be far too long for anyone to wield one-handed, yet he somehow manages to do so. I block, again and again, unable to find an opening. He is far stronger than me, and even as I parry I brace myself against the shock going up my arms.

“Come on!” Shan Yu roars. “Where is Hua the Relentless? What sort of showdown is this?”

I say nothing, too focused on defending myself. He pauses for just a moment, and I seize that opportunity by lunging forward, but it’s what he was expecting. My slash falls just shy, and before I can right myself he grabs my blade with a leather-gloved hand and yanks me forward. I flail for a moment before falling inelegantly from the saddle. He releases my sword as if it were nothing.

I scramble up in an instant and put my blade up. Shan Yu is smiling down at my, holding out the hand he used to grab my blade. Crimson wells up on his palm before splashing ominously on the ground between us. 

“I’ll let you have your claim to first blood drawn for that,” he says. “Since we both know it doesn’t matter.”

My sword trembles in my hand as I back away from him on my socked feet. I’m on foot with no protection but my rawhide, against an armoured soldier on horseback. My heart is pounding so hard it seems to drown out all other sound.

Shan Yu’s horse takes a step towards me, and I take one back. There is no way I can meet many more of his blows, not with his superior strength and the downwards momentum he has when striking down from horseback, so I retreat, little by little, until I take one more step back and my heel slips over the edge. I cannot glance behind me, but I know that if I do I will see that river far below me. 

“No more room, soldier boy,” Shan Yu hisses, stalking towards me. The fire has gone out of me, but years of training and experience keep me facing forward, my sword raised. “What’re you going to do now?”

“Even if you kill me here,” I reply coldly. “What good will it do you? Your army is gone. Your men are defeated. This victory brings you nothing.”

“Oh, it brings me something,” he sneers. “It brings me the satisfaction of seeing that righteous little head of yours cut clean from your body.”

I shift my position, lowering myself into a better fighting stance.

“Then perhaps I should just step off the edge of this cliff right now, to spare you that satisfaction.”

My voice trembles slightly as I say it, and I am filled with the realisation that I don’t want to die, not here, not now, not by this man’s hand. I was a coward for wishing for death up on the wall. A coward more willing to take the easy way out than build a future from himself. 

Shan Yu narrows his eyes. His bloodied hand curls on his saddle horn. 

“If you were going to throw yourself off you would’ve done it by now.”

“Are you willing to bet on that?”

I ease my foot over the edge again, even as the feeling of nothingness beneath me sends warning messages shooting through my brain.

The sound of hoofbeats comes thundering up the path. From the corner of my eye I see Fengfeng, charging into the clearing. I am centered enough not to let this distract me, but the rider that comes galloping up behind her surprises me so much that not even a lifetime of martial arts training can keep me from turning my good eye to see if it’s really true.

“Shang!”

He drives his horse towards us with the determination of a madman, his armour gleaming in the light of the setting sun giving him the appearance of a martial hero bearing down from the heavens. My jaw drops and my hands loosen their grip on my sword. I am so stunned that I don’t even notice when Shan Yu raises his.

The blow catches me directly in the shoulder, cleaving through muscle and tendon and slicing through the damaged rawhide across my chest with ease. Iron grates across my collar bone. I look down in surprise as my flesh opens, barely able to comprehend what I’m seeing as my chest blossoms with crimson. 

Distantly I hear the sounds of my commander shouting, of ringing iron and the thud of blade against flesh, but it is as if I’m underwater. My reality has narrowed to the wound on my chest, and the unbelievable agony coursing through me. I am dimly aware of tears rolling down my cheeks as I stagger backwards. Strong hands brush my face, and I look up to see Li Shang on horseback, his eyes wide with concern. He is saying something, but my consciousness is fleeting fast. His face suddenly twists with pain, and his hands go to his side. Through a narrow chink in his armour protrudes a tiny dagger. There is a hideous, stomach-churning sound that manages to break through my bubble — the sound of Shan Yu’s broken laughter, his mouth curled into a bloody smile from where he lies on the ground beyond us. 

It is the last thing I hear before my legs give up, and I tumble over the edge of the cliff. Shang’s hand latches around my wrist, but his other is still clutched around the knife in his side. He yells something, then he too is falling, weightless in the cold mountain air.

  
  


I’m dreaming of dancing dragons and lucky crickets, peacefully drifting through nothingness when suddenly there is a brilliant light and I am pulled forcefully back into my body. Water is in my eye, my nose, my lungs. I splutter desperately, flailing blindly for a moment before I manage to blink the water from my eye. My clothes cling to me, damp and heavy.

“Oh, praise the Buddha! You’re awake.”

I blink again. My head feels just as waterlogged as the rest of me, and it takes more than just a moment for me to process what’s going on.

“Commander.” The words barely escape my lips. I try to prop myself up, but another dizzying spell of pain runs through me and I flop back down. Rock. That’s what I’m lying on. Cold, hard rock. 

His face shifts from desperate joy to solemn disappointment. “So you’re back to that. You know, just before we fell you called me Shang.”

Fall? I try to recall how we got here, but it’s still murky. Sensation is starting to return to my cold body, and along with it all the unbearable pain. I put a hand to my shoulder. It comes away bloody. I’m dying, I realise slowly. I’m bleeding out. 

A warm hand wraps around my bloody one.

“You’re going to be okay, Ping,” Shang tells me, his voice raw. I roll my head towards him and see a single tear rolls down his cheek. “You’ve already come this far.” His other hand moves to pull back the crossed collar of my tunic, and it is at this moment my clarity returns. My hand darts out and catches his wrist as if it has a mind of its own.

Shang’s eyes widen for a moment, but then they fall on the red ribbon tied around my wrist, exposed at last as my sleeve falls back and reveals it.

“You…?” His voice rises in disbelief. “That’s not the ribbon from the moon festival, is it? You really kept that?”

Even as the blood seeps out of me my mind drifts to that night three autumns ago, when we had been stationed in another little northern farming village. The locals had been celebrating a mid-autumn harvest festival, and the men had been given leave to go enjoy the festivities and local women. Seeing as I had no interest in finding some farmer’s daughter to woo, I had gone to watch the elders perform rituals and offer their prayers to the local gods in thanks for a plentiful harvest. It was quaint, and had reminded me of some of the traditions of my hometown. Li Shang had found me there, sitting by a fire under the harvest moon. He had given me a good luck charm one of the locals had offered him in return for protecting the village, hung on a lucky red ribbon. The charm, some little trinket or other, had long since been left on the road, but I still sometimes used that red ribbon to tie back my hair. 

I smile slightly at the memory of that night, when I had allowed myself a moment of happiness and intimacy with my commander. Oh gods. I’m really starting to slip away now, aren’t I?

“It’s good luck,” I reply hoarsely. “Now don’t touch me.”

His brows furrow with concern and frustration.

“Hua Ping. I know I said you were going to be okay, but you’re going to bleed to death if you don’t let me help you.” He pulls his hand from my grip. I finally manage to push myself up onto my elbows and glare at him. Now I recall all of what has happened to us, the seriousness of the blow Shan Yu dealt me, and none of it bodes well for us. 

“What’re are you going to do about it? That bastard nearly hacked my arm off, wrapping a bit of damp cloth around it isn’t going to stop the inevitable.”

Shang’s eyes burn with a dark intensity not unlike the one he displayed when he rode to my rescue. 

“Don’t make me use force, Ping. I know all about your little bit about not letting anyone take care of you. I was there when the doctors took out your eye, remember? You held my hand and begged me not to let them do anything to you. Well, if they hadn’t done anything then you might’ve died of infection. Whatever this is, it’s not manly or stoic or whatever you think it is, and it’s certainly not helpful.”

He pins my other hand to the ground when I take a swat at him, but I am too weak to fight him. Lucky for him, because his own injury doesn’t look to be fairing well either. I struggle uselessly for a moment before going limp with despair. Twelve years with no one suspecting a thing, and now that the war is over it’s all going to be forced into the light. At least I’ll be dead soon. Perhaps it is for the best that Shang is the one who exposes me. Now he’ll finally know the reason why I’ve kept us apart all this time.

That’s not to say that I’m at peace with lying back and letting everything I’ve done be torn away in an instant. Shang’s hand peeling back my tunic, that oh-so-earnest look in his eyes as he thinks he’s helping me — it makes me sick to my stomach. If I weren’t this far gone I’d be in tears by now, but all I can summon at this moment is a deep emptiness. It’s almost funny. I can spend a third of my life serving my country and becoming one of its most well known heroes, but it’ll all mean nothing in the face of two useless lumps of flesh. People are so fucking stupid.

The wet fabric of my collar comes away with a soft sucking noise as Shang pulls it aside. His hand suddenly tenses, and I know he has seen. Perhaps he can see my heart through that cut, too. It certainly feels like it’s about to force its way out of my chest.

There is a long, tense moment of silence, and every moment of it I wish for my heart to beat harder, to pump the blood out of me or else to just burst and spare me the agony. My commander stares at me for a small eternity, hand still frozen around the edge of my collar.

He backs away from me, his eyes wide with betrayal.

"You're a... All this time you've..." Shang shakes his head. His voice is unbelievably fragile. "Gods, Ping, you're a girl?" he murmurs.

I let out a high, nervous laugh that does nothing to hide my distress. "You seem an awful lot more certain about it than me." 

One cannot be friends with a man like Zhang Wei without picking up a coping mechanism or two. Shang sucks in a shaky breath. He gets up abruptly and begins to pace the river bank, running nervous hands through his hair which hangs loose around his shoulders. Clearly my joke is going to be ignored.

“I can’t — You — For so many years — I can’t believe that you would  _ lie  _ to us all like that!” He throws his hands out in disbelief. 

Anger bubbles up inside me.

“What, like I could just be honest with you? You wouldn’t understand how I feel even if I told you.”

He wheels on me.

“Oh? And how is that? How do  _ you  _ feel? Because right now  _ I’m completely fucking heartbroken. _ ” His voice cracks and his pacing comes to a halt. “I  _ loved  _ you, Ping, if that really is your name. I thought I had found the person who finally understood me, someone who might accept me for who I am.”

“A luxury not all of us get to have,” I butt in, pain drowned out by resentment. It is sudden and fierce, but all I feel at the moment is disgust at the world. At people like Shang, who’ve never looked in a mirror and been struck with the knowledge that they did not know who they were, yet still felt that in moments like these that  _ they  _ were the ones entitled to pain.

“Everything I knew about you, about us, was a  _ lie _ ,” Shang nearly shouts, his fists clenching. “The person that I’ve fought beside, who has been my friend, whom I’ve poured my heart out to — he isn’t  _ real _ .”

“Don’t say that!” I yell, though the effort drains me. “I may not be what you expected, but Hua Ping _is_ real. Everything I said and did, I meant them. Because I am Hua Ping. I am Hua the Relentless. I’m still _me_.” It is not until I say the words, ones that I have thought before but never had the heart to speak, that I know with certainty that they are true. A weight seems to lift from my chest as that sinks in.

I take a breath to compose myself. I have thought of ways I might voice this before, lying on my cot at night and trying to put words to how I feel. I’m not sure when I started to feel like a man. It was not a sudden moment, a shining epiphany that put an end to all my late-night contemplation. Even after I had crossed that nameless barrier I was still plagued with doubts and insecurities, with every spare moment spent turning it over in my mind until it became nothing but background noise. 

“You believe in reincarnation, don’t you?” I ask between teeth clenched in pain. Shang seems caught off guard and takes a moment to answer.

“Yes,” he replies, unsure.

“So if that is the case, if I could be born an earthworm or an ox, a man or a woman, then it is not our flesh and bone bodies that make us  _ us.  _ Our immortal soul that passes from vessel to vessel is not tied to man nor woman, not even to humanity. We are not defined by our current bodies, only by the choices we make and the lives we choose to lead. And hey, if a man can work his way up to enlightenment or godhood, then surely I can work my way up to just being a man.”

“Alright,” he says slowly. “So maybe you don’t have the spirit of a woman — maybe there is no such thing. But that does not change the fact that you have done things improper for your current body. Fighting in wars, riding horses as you do, not to mention associating so closely with men, it must surely be damaging.”

“You’re not listening!” I mean to slam my fists down in frustration, but the movement sends spines of agony through my shoulder. “Regardless of my body, I still have the same soul as yours, and in this life at least I feel the force of  _ yang  _ move within me _. _ Theology aside, I know how I feel. I know how I like to be seen. And that’s — that’s as Hua Ping!”

I slump back down to the ground in defeat, not feeling particularly manly after such an outburst. Still, saying it out loud doesn’t change the truth of my feeling.

“You really believe it,” Shang says. His voice has become gentle, almost pitying. “You really think that you’re not a girl.”

“Yes,” I reply miserably. “I don’t expect you to understand it. Just know that I’m not lying to you. I never have.”

He purses his lips together in contemplation. The betrayal has not felt his eyes, but there is an element of calculation in his expression now.

“It is true that I… cannot deny the virtues you have shown to me these past years. I would normally never think a woman capable of such things, but you have proven yourself to be a true warrior. Better than most men. For that, at least, I must respect you.” He pauses again. I throw an arm over my face. If he thinks halfhearted flattery will somehow make me feel better, he thought wrong.

“And I will admit, your plight is not completely unfamiliar to me.”

I open my eye and turn to look at him. His face is bare again, emotions showing so clearly on his face in that wonderfully honest way of his. And amongst those emotions I see...love? His eyes shine with it, pure and bright.

“I told you once, a long time ago, that you reminded me of myself during my academy years,” he murmurs. “Well, you and I have come a long way since then, but some of that still holds true. It’s not the same, clearly, but before I arrived in the city I had no idea a man could love another man. It wasn’t until I started school and saw that there were people like that that it even occurred to me such a thing was possible. It was a little weird, but I understood the concept of it. It wasn’t until I started to feel that way about one of my classmates that I really thought of it again.

For the longest time I didn’t understand what was happening to me, because even though I knew a boy could like a boy, I had always liked girls before. I had a girlfriend for a while. Her name was Sana and for seven months she was all I could think about. The prettiest girl in the city, and the smartest, too. I knew that I had loved her, or at the very least been attracted to her, so I couldn’t comprehend it when I started to feel the same way about this guy. The feelings were familiar — the airiness, the warmth, the way I couldn’t get him out of my head, but I refused to believe it because no one had told me about the possibility of  _ both _ , just as no one had ever told me about just the one. It was never talked about, so I assumed it wasn’t possible.

The guy I had developed feelings for — he didn’t think it was possible either. He told me that I had just been fooling myself into thinking I loved that girl, because it was what was expected of me. All of the guys like us did that, he said, since we would all end up having to marry a woman someday, but in our hearts it would always be a lie. I believed him for the longest time and dismissed everything I had had with Sana as nothing but an act. It took years to come to terms with it, but eventually I realised that that wasn’t really how I felt, and I was the only one who could decide that. And that no matter what everyone else said of it, it did not change  _ my  _ truth. So I guess perhaps I should find some sympathy for your situation.”

He breaks eye contact at last, his dark hair falling in front of his face.

“I — I still can’t say that I entirely understand, or that I forgive you or anything, but…”

“But you still care about me enough that maybe you’ll save me from bleeding out?” I prompt, patting my shoulder for good measure. Best not to let such heavy emotions hang in the air for long. As long as I don’t die within the next day, we’ll have plenty of time to work through all this later. But it does, I admit to myself, still make my heart ache to see Shang laying himself out like that, especially when I know he feels so betrayed. At least some things in our relationship have not changed.

He does not seem particularly amused by my attempt to lighten the mood, but he steps forward nonetheless as I knew he would. Big-hearted Li Shang would not let anyone die in front of him, man, woman, or otherwise. I sit in uncomfortable silence as he lays his tunic out on the ground and pulls a long strip from it. 

“I’m sorry about this,” he says stiffly as he tugs off my soaked clothes, until I am left shivering and exposed in my undergarments. The gash across my body is on full display, blood and water running down my body. I have to look away so I don’t pass out from the dizziness. More pain shoots through me as Shang winds the cloth tightly over my wounds, putting a hand gently but chastely behind my back and lifting me up in order to pull it all the way around. An involuntary hiss escapes my lips as he tugs the makeshift bandage tight. 

“There,” he says, straightening. “It won’t stop the blood, but hopefully that’ll buy you some time.”

I breathe in, trying to center myself again and block out the screaming fog of pain that clouds my mind whenever I move.

“Help me up.”

Shang moves to obey me a second before halting, as if he has suddenly remembered that he can no longer treat me in the same casual way as before.

“You’re not going to be able to stand like that.”

“Then I’ll fall down trying. Just help me up!” I wave my arm at him under he heaves an irritated sigh and bends down beside me. He flinches when I clutch him, which I pray is just because of the wound in his side, but then he averts his eyes and begrudgingly lets me pull myself against him. His skin is sticky and wet against mine, his body heat warming my rapidly cooling body. We only manage to hobble a few paces before my arm burns and I collapse again him, delirious. His muscles tense beneath me and he cursed softly under his breath.

“This isn’t going to work.”

Finding a little alcove in the rock a safe distance from the river, Shang deposits me on the ground as I pant my way through the agony ripping my consciousness to shreds.

I dig my nails into his arm, the sensation of his soft skin the only one I can make out, but he pushes me softly yet firmly away. 

When I come to my senses again there is a small fire crackling. Night has fallen, and the bright northern stars shine overhead. Shang sits across from it, his eyes dark in the firelight. His hair is tied back now and is again clad in his red tunic. He shifts slightly on the log he’s dragged up as a bench when he notices I’m awake. 

“Your clothes are dry. If you’d like to put them on,” he says coldly, in a way that indicates he’d very much prefer if I did. Said clothes are hanging beside the fire, probably permanently smelling of smoke by now. I try to speak, but my dry tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. Shang gets up and disappears into the darkness for a moment, before returning with a rag dripping with water.

“I couldn’t find anything to use as a cup, so this’ll have to do,” he says, as he twists it and lets the precious water drop into my mouth. My tongue stretches out greedily to catch every last drop. When the messy affair is finished Shang sits back down and I lay gratefully back down on the earth. My bandages have gone dark with blood and the wound still sends waves of torture through me, but it still feels as if I have an edge to cling to, at least for the moment.

“What now?” I rasp.

“I’m the only one who can walk at the moment, so I suppose I should set out and find one of the mountain villages that should be nearby,” Shang replies. His eyes stay trained on the flames dancing between us. The day’s revelations sit heavy on our shoulders, but I have no desire to bring it up again. Best to leave him to process this however he will. “If we hang around here for too long there’s too much of a risk that one of our injuries will get infected, not to mention that you will bleed out if you aren’t stitched up in time, but you already know that. Our best shot is just for me to leave you here for a bit on your own, and I’ll bring back help when I find it.”

I stare into the fire, my mind sluggish with pain. For some reason I keep returning to the day I first met Zhang Wei, and the way he instantly gravitated to my side. The whole reason he ever approached me was because he recognised me as a fellow conscript. How will he feel when he learns my deepest truth? “And…?”

“And what?”

“What about after that?” I ask, fearing the answer. It is a question that I have been asking myself for years now, though having Shang know my secret significantly alters the future events I have in mind. “Once we’re all better. Will you go back to the Emperor and say that you lost your general? Or will you...will you let me come with you?” My voice begins to give out towards the end there. 

Shang sits perfectly still, not a muscle moving in his body. He’s still wearing that mask of sterness that he puts on in front of his men, with a touch of the low anger that was in his eyes when he looked down at me for the first, my face throbbing from a broken lip. Now that I think about it, one of the few times I’ve seen him publicly shed his stoic exterior was when he learned his father had died. I’ve seen worse war horrors since then — unborn children cut from their mothers’ stomachs, soldiers forced to watch their families tortured, starving peasants whose crops have been burnt dying from eating fetid mud, but for my commander it must still be one of the worst days of his life. 

“We still have getting out of this alive to worry about before we start thinking to the future,” he responds. His features tighten for a moment, tensing at some internal pain. “You should sleep. I’ll go get you help tomorrow.”

The fever has not yet taken me, but I can sense the stirrings of it within my blood and in the unnatural flush of my bare skin. If I tilt my head up from where I lie I can see snow above me, yet I feel like a piece of meat on a spit, and it is only a matter of time before I begin to burn. Shang took care of my bandages this morning, washing them with river water and wrapping them tighter before helping me back into my clothes, though it’s about as helpful as giving a starving orphan a bowl of rice before kicking him back out into a snowstorm. Now I am alone, with any sense of the passage of time running away between my fingers like grains of sand as the pain courses through me.

There are a few strips of cloth beside me, soaked in water, but I barely have the strength to wring them out into my mouth. All my remaining power, already feeble enough, drained away in the night. The only thing left to do is lie here, and pray to every god in the heavens and a few of my forefathers as well that Shang will return with help in time. At least there are a few puffy clouds over head so I have something to look at.

“Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?”

I flinch at the sound of the voice.

“That showdown with that big bad Shan Yu didn’t go quite as planned, huh?”

I roll my head to one side, trying to pinpoint the speaker.

“Wei? Is that you?”

“‘Fraid not,” says what is undeniably Wei’s voice.”You’re Hua Ping, though, aren’t you? Your ancestors sent me to look out for you.”

There is a flash of red against the dark rocks, and then there are two reptilian eyes looking down on me.  _ Snake! _ Screams my brain. I cry out and swat at the creature, which grunts in protest.

“Hey, is that any way to treat a gift from the heavens?” he complains. 

With a great deal of effort and a significant amount of pain, I prop myself up against a rock. The little creature before me is small and scaled, with whiskers like a catfish.

“My ancestors sent a  _ lizard  _ to look out for me?” I ask, incredulous.

His serpentine face somehow manages to look offended.

“Lizard? Kid, I’m a fucking  _ dragon _ . Ever heard of them? Ancient, wise, filled with  _ qi  _ energy, have power over rain and stuff?”

I shake my head. Even without a human face, his mannerisms are strangely similar to Wei’s. He’s just as ridiculous too, and I cannot help but let a smile play at the corners of my lips.

“Of course I’ve heard of dragons, but they’re huge, and beautiful, and definitely do not swear. You’re like some jester’s caricature.”

“Who knows, maybe your ancestors sent me here as a bit of comic relief. They weren’t particularly clear on that matter.”

“I thought dragons had a deep connection with ancestors,” I point out, which seems to get to him.

“Yes! Of course! But the spirits of the dead aren’t the most straightforward people in the world.”

I consider this situation for a moment.

“So they just told you to come guide Hua Ping?”

“Yup.”

“Hua Ping specifically? Not anything else that maybe means something along the lines of ‘magnolia?’”

The little creature’s eyes narrow. “No, not that I remember…” His tail snaps out suddenly, and he shakes his head in embarrassment.

“Oh! Sorry, I didn’t realise why you were asking. Being a magical being I’m not too familiar with human perceptions of gender and sexuality. Plenty of us dragons can reproduce asexually, after all. No worries, Hua Ping, the dead have no interest in the petty constructs of the living. You don’t tend to put as much faith in societal expectations once you become a being of pure energy and that the skin you’re born into isn’t an end-all be-all.”

It’s a little dizzying to hear. I’ve spent most of my life at this point sure that my ancestors are probably completely disgraced by me, what with spending my entire childhood with my parents warning me that if I did not abide by the principles of Confucius and be a good daughter then they would cast me from their favour. I’d dare say it’s not an unfair assumption that becoming a man does not exactly go hand in hand with being the ideal wife and daughter. So to hear that they are not only looking out for me but also accepting of me? It is more than I can hope from eve my own parents.

The dragon watches my expression carefully and twitches like a dog wagging its tail.

“Glad to be the bearer of good news.” 

He cocks his head to one side, listening out for something. “Seems like that commander of yours is coming back this way, so I should be heading out.” 

His little red body bounds up the steep rocks beside me with ease, and he turns around once to look at me.

“Have faith, Hua Ping. You’re brave enough than most of the men in this empire, just by merit of having the heart to be one.”

I want to ask him so many things, but sensation has returned to my body with sudden clarity, so all I can muster is, “Is this real, and not some fever dream?”

He cocks his head again, this time a touch more judgmental.

“You should know better than to rely on the opinions of others, especially for something so subjective. Find your own truths, Ping.”

And with that, he is gone.

Voices murmur in concern around me, in some dialect I’ve never heard before that seems to run all their words together into one long, incomprehensible stream. A cold hand presses to my forehead.

“Hey, Hua. Let’s get you back.” Shang’s familiar voice cuts through the haze. He stares down at me, eyes dark with concern, and I smile.

“I love you, Li Shang,” I say. And then I pass out.

An immeasurable amount of time passes in some liminal state, in which the only things I am aware of are pain and cold. I resurface in a dark room. A straw mat separates my back from the hard dirt floor, and there is a distinct tightness in my front that I can detect even lying down. When I run my hand over my shoulder I feel the bumps of stitches below the bandages. Pain still pulses through me and my skin is feverishly hot, but it is a vast difference from the blinding agony and emptiness of bleeding out. Mainly I am just exhausted.

Eventually I hear low voices from somewhere beyond. Light fills the room, revealing a long-dead firepit and rows of jars and dried herbs. A figure moves towards me. So many beads and trinkets hang from her that with each step the clinking sounds like rain. A gnarled hand steadies me as she touches a cup to my lips. I drink instinctively and am greeted with perhaps the most disgusting thing I’ve ever tasted. She clucks disapprovingly when I grimace and pours more of the vile substance down my throat with grandmotherly sternness. Though her words are incomprehensible to me, I can easily imagine what she must be saying. 

When all is done, she sets the cup aside and gestures for me to let her have a look at my bandages, and I lie back reluctantly. She changes the bandages quickly and efficiently, throwing the old ones into a basket beside her. Underneath, my skin is slimy and damp from fever sweat. The old woman wipes it away with a damp cloth she magics from the depths of her robes. At last she tidies everything away and stands up. She moves towards the front of her hut, calling something in her heavy accent. Voices respond from outside and the woven cloth hanging in the entrance is lifted, letting in a dazzling ray of sunshine.

“Are you alright?” asks a familiar gentle voice. Li Shang crouches down beside my mat, the old woman hovering behind him with a soft smile on her craggy face.

I tilt my head towards him to get a better look. He’s wearing different clothes now, a soft green tunic embroidered at the edges, and shapeless boots with a much lighter tread than the military-issued ones. His expression is one of controlled concern, the one a commander might wear if his star general was injured, but there is an extra furrow in his brow that suggests hidden strain.

“No,” I rasp, disturbed by the faint quality of my voice. “What’s going on?”

“We’re in a little village just south of the Taihangs,” he replies. “Though the Wei river carried us a bit farther than I thought. It shouldn’t be that far west to the imperial city from here. And about you.” His eyes dart to where the bandage peeks out from under my tunic. “You’ve been out for about five days. Madame Chagur, the lovely woman here, says some tendons have been severed in your left shoulder. Unfortunately at this point it doesn’t like you’re going to be able to use that shoulder again.”

I listen halfheartedly, barely processing the words. Out of some form of dark curiosity and disbelief at the news I attempt to lift my left arm. Before I can get the tips of my fingers off the ground pain flashes through me and my arm falls limply back down. All I’m capable of responding with is mild disappointment. Li Shang watches quietly for a moment before continuing.

“Not only that, but apparently you’ve basically crushed your ribcage with those bandages you were using to…”

His soldierly demeanour breaks for a second and he glances to the side.

“... _ conceal  _ your chest.”

As if I wasn’t able to notice that myself. As if I haven’t lived through eleven years of waking up in the morning to see the ugly bruising on my chest, to have spent hours of training trying to make up for my shortness of breath with strength and technique. Of hating how I didn’t have a choice. Shang must notice my sour expression because he shakes his head in a vaguely apologetic manner.

“To think that you were able to fight like that...” he begins. 

“It’s impressive, isn’t it?” I lie my head back and close my eye. I’m too tired to pursue this particular topic at the moment. Too tired for any emotions at the moment, let alone distress. “Now, I’d like to remain passed out for a few more days if I could.”

“Alright. I’ll leave you to heal.” I listen to the sounds of his clothes shifting as he stands and his footsteps padding towards the doorway. He pauses for a moment.

“Not a word on this, you hear?” he says to my caretaker. There is a lightness in his tone that suggests he already has no doubts about her trustworthiness. The woman makes a pleasant sound of agreement, though I doubt she really understands a word he’s saying. A sudden change in the colour of light against my eyelid and he’s gone. I fall asleep to the gentle sounds of Madame Chagur sweeping the dirt floor, like rain on a rooftop.

We stay in the little village for nearly a full cycle of the moon. After I gain enough strength to move around, nourished by a steady supply of hearty soups and herbal remedies from the good Madame Chagur, I regularly go out and help the villagers with little tasks. There are a few men there, former soldiers, that know the more standard form of our language from their time in the military, and they eagerly serve as our translators. 

One of them must recognise us from somewhere, one of the perks of having an eyepatch and being two heads shorter than most men, because it only takes a few days before they are bowing to us and call us  _ honoured general  _ and  _ blessed commander _ . The oldest of them, a half-blind goat farmer who introduces himself as Husi, informs me with delight that he served under my father.

“A good man, Hua Zhou,” he says. “It is no surprise that his son would become a great soldier as well.”

I smile awkwardly and offer some bland bit about the gods being the ones who did everything, not me.

Li Shang continues to honour his promise that we would not worry about what sits between us until we’re out of the woods. He’s more distant than ever, spending long hours going down into the river gully and walking along the banks by himself, but he continues to call me Hua Ping and never betrays me to any of the villagers. A few times, when my wound begins to hurt again or I go lightheaded, genuine alarm flashes in his eyes before he manages to school himself into friendly concern. He’s never been too good at hiding himself from me, after all.  Once I even manage to tear a stitch carrying something heavy and he rushes over to catch me when I fall. I look up to see him staring down at me, his arm around my waist, and for a moment the awkward pause filled with rapidly beating hearts and held breath feels more like the tension from the past, when we were just two friends on the verge of being something else. Then he ruins the moment by pulling me back to my feet and saying matter-of-factly, “Let’s get you back to Madame Chagur,” and the torn stitch isn’t the only thing hurting my chest. 

When at last we are both well enough, it comes time for us to head to the imperial city. On my last day Husi insists on me coming out with him and the goats. We don’t go far from the village, on account of my still being a bit short of breath, but as soon as the goats find a nice bit of green grass we sit down and unpack our lunch. 

“It will be a shame to see you go,” Husi says, pouring some dark tea from the little pot he carries in his bag. “We do not have much contact with the rest of the empire. Were it not for those northern worms pressing at the border, there would not be much cause for the people up here to feel any attachment to the emperor.”

“That’s one thing you can say for them,” I reply, accepting the little teacup he offers. “The late Honoured Emperor Taiwu, may the gods welcome him into their celestial halls, might have put an end to the Sixteen Kingdoms, but it is truly the enemies at the borders that have kept this empire united for the past few generations. Perhaps we should pray they come again, so it will last five hundred more.”

“There’s no need to pray for that,” Husi says dryly. “As long as there is an empire and there are Rouran, there will be war.”

“As I am painfully aware,” I sigh listlessly. It is the same miserable conclusion that I had come to a thousand times as general. Husi’s leathery face softens and he places a hand on my shoulder.

“That does not mean this peace you have brought us is for nothing, Hua, no matter how temporary. You have given this land time to heal, to raise children and crops without the threat of war. General Hua the Relentless will live on in the memories of the people as one of the greatest warriors this empire has seen.”

It is a nice thought, one easily eclipsed by the more pressing one that soon I might be knownas more than just one of the soldiers who saved this country from invaders. If Shang decides to betray the memory of all we’ve had together even more than I already did, then I’ll probably become immortalised as a laughingstock, or a symbol of military incompetence. I picture a large man with beady eyes saying, _Look what the men of this land have become! They can’t even fight as well as a woman._ _Perhaps I should send my_ daughter _off to the emperor the next time there’s a draft!_ The sort of man who’d sell his daughter to a literal pig if it offered him a copper coin. The sort that would just laugh if I told him that the word ‘woman’ didn’t apply to me at all. 

“I wish I could just stay here,” I tell Husi, my throat tightening as I look into his kind old face. “It’s not like I can ever fight again. Who would it hurt if I just spent the rest of my days as an anonymous goatherd?” 

Living my final years in peace and solitude. Never having to confront my family. Never having to explain myself to anyone. Dying quietly in my sleep of old age, with none of my neighbours ever having to know I was not born with the name ‘Hua Ping.’ It would be so easy. 

But Husi’s brow furrows.

“That sounds a lot like running away to me, Hua. Are you really telling me there’s no one out there that needs you? No family? No friends? Not Commander Li?”

“Commander Li doesn’t need me,” I reply, startled and maybe a tad bit guilty. 

The goatherd smiles his snaggletoothed smile and tilts his head at me. 

“I can tell there’s something going on between the two of you at the moment, but it’s not hard to guess that the two of you have been friends for a long, long time. Whatever your current conflict is, I’ll pray you two can solve it on the road to the imperial city. Not having you by his side is clearly tearing your poor friend to shreds.”

I blink, feeling a bit foolish. I guess Shang was better at hiding his feelings from me than I thought. It’s true that after any sort of turmoil, any pressing life choice, any tragedy, Shang has always come straight to me to vent and almost literally have a shoulder to cry on. It’s not like I haven’t noticed how troubled he’s been lately, but I’d assumed that was just him being upset and confused with me, not because he needed me but felt like he couldn’t come to me anymore. That the reason he is hurting is because the role I’ve served as his rock as been suddenly vacated and now he has nowhere to direct the feelings he can’t handle all by himself. I’m the only person he can talk to about all this. Shit. 

“It’s true that he’s always...leaned heavily on my council in the past,” I tell Husi. “But I’m not so sure that our current problem is one you can come back from.”

“Are you sure? When two people care about each other enough, then forgiveness and compromise can be found in anything.”

“Well…” I stare down at my reflection in the tea. Maybe it’s time for a little optimism. “I’ll give it a shot.” I’m not called Hua the Relentless for nothing.

The villagers send us off with a little goat cart, some fine new clothes, good luck charms made by the children, and enough jars of pickled cabbage to feed an army. We wave and say our goodbyes with cheer, but as soon as the village is out of sight we fall back into silence — not a particularly tense silence, but not the intimate, comfortable one that two close friends might sit in either. I sit perched on the edge of the goat cart, watching the road disappear under the wheels. Earlier today I tied my hair up with the lucky red ribbon, hoping that it would somehow offer me a bit of traction with the gods. Not so far, at least. 

Shang drives the goats, walking just behind them as they trot along. He doesn’t turn around to face me except to ask once if the rough road is jostled my slinged left arm too much. All around no fun. 

Night begins to fall, and we direct the goats to a copse of trees along the side of the path. Shang unpacks our bags, claiming that my current one-handedness will only make me get in the way, and we eat a meal of cold cabbage and dried strips of haw jelly. When we are done he wishes me a good night and lies down on his mat to sleep. I, on the other hand, am filled with far too much frantic energy to sleep even if I wanted to. Instead, I lean back against a tree and stare up at the sliver of sky I can make out beyond the dark leaves. Bright stars dot the heavens. Based on their alignment, we’re probably only a week or so away from my hometown. 

My meditation is broken when I hear a rustling in the trees. I freeze, my back going rigid against the tree trunk. Darkness and my lack of depth perception make it difficult, but I can just see two figures standing at the edge of the copse. One steps forward, a blade glinting in the moonlight. Shang is still sleeping on the ground right in front of him. Instinct and training allows me to steady my breathing. I stand up as slowly as possible, leaning back into the shadows, as the thief pads towards Shang. 

“Check the cart,” he hisses to his companion in a heavy accent. “I’ll take care of the travelers.”

As soon as the other one turns away, I step out of the shadows and stand before the man with a knife. There is a faint intake of breath from behind his mask.

“So you’re not asleep,” he says. “Alright. I can work with that.” And he rushes towards me.

I drop into a stronger stance as he runs at me, dodging to the side as he takes a wide swing at me, the blade whistling past me in the night air. I grab his knife arm, pulling him forward and pinning it against my side. He stumbles towards me. There is a moment of hesitation on my part when I realise I can’t attack with my left hand, so the knee to his stomach is less steady than I would’ve hoped for.

“Li Shang!” I yell as I release the man. He doubles over, trying to regain the air I knocked out of him. “Wake up!”

He stirs. “Hua? What is it? I — “

He sees the second thief heading towards us and instantly jumps to his feet. Those officer school boys. Out of old habit we end up back to back, falling together naturally after years of fighting together. My opponent doesn’t have time to recover when I come at him again, this time with a kick in the groin. The poor martial arts trainers for the Emperor’s Guard would be ashamed, but it certainly is effective. To his credit, the thief manages to hold onto his blade.

I bat him upside the head.

“Drop the knife and I won’t have to castrate you with my boot,” I warn him. He relents and raises his hands in defeat.

“Who the fuck  _ are  _ you guys?” he gasps. 

“We’re the ones that brought peace to these lands, and you repay them by trying to slit their throats in their sleep?” I pick up the blade and study it. A dull, cheap thing, but perhaps it could come in handy for simple chores.

“But the Imperial Army marched on _ages_ ago,” he protests, as if this is proof we’re lying. “You — “

I bring the pommel of the knife down on his temple. He collapses to the ground. When I turn I see that my commander has dispatched of the other.

“One-armed and I still got it,” I smirk at him. The battle-fury drains away quickly nowadays, as if I lost a part of my rage along with all the blood. 

Shang shakes his head.

“You terrify me sometimes,” he says. “Like when you were fighting with Shan Yu? I’ve never seen you look so murderous. It’s a side of you that I — “ He falters, leaving us standing across from each other in the dark. I restrain the urge to make some silly comment, to deflect all this tension building up inside us instead of having to confront it.

After a moment he says, “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” There is more emotion in those two words than I would’ve liked him to hear.

“For the way I dismissed you as a warrior. I still don’t quite understand how you think you’re actually a man, but no matter how you feel about yourself you’re still a good soldier by any standards. It’s just — it goes against everything I’ve ever been taught. But it’s still stupid of me to deny it, when you’ve saved my life so many times, like just now. You’ve saved this  _ country _ . For that, at least, you should be honoured.”

I finger the thief’s blade awkwardly. “Thanks, I guess. And I don’t need you to  _ understand _ me, just…” I look into his eyes, glittering in the starlight.

“Are you still mad at me?”

He scratches the back of his neck. “I’m not sure that  _ mad  _ is the right word. It took a while to process, but I know there was no way you could have revealed yourself me. After all, I didn’t take it that well. I just — I don’t — It’s confusing. You’re still  _ you _ .”

“Glad you noticed that,” I put in. He shakes his head.

“Let me talk. What I’m saying is, I see your face, I hear your voice, I see you fighting and laughing and you still interrupt me with stupid quips. I see Hua Ping. And I know — now this is embarrassing, but — well, you know how things were between us. You know I wanted to be more than friends. I loved you as a man, and I know I could have loved you as a woman, if there were different circumstances, but now every part of my upbringing is telling me that it’s wrong for us to be standing here like this, for us to even be friends.” He hangs his head. I cough uncomfortably, my heart thudding from his partial love confession. 

“It’s my head against my heart, you see,” he mumbles miserably. “I want to believe in you, Ping, because I know that is what would make you happy. And because I want to believe that the man I see in you, the man I fell in love with, is real. I want that, and so much more.”

I swallow down the lump in my throat. My chest seems to expand, almost painfully so, and I reach out to give him a one-armed embrace. He goes rigid for a moment before relaxing slightly.

“I know how you feel,” I whisper to him.”When I first took up a sword, that’s when I first started going through my struggle. It took so many years and so much doubt and confusion, so much of me telling myself that I was confused and wrong and deluded, even when I couldn’t hide the way I felt from myself anymore. Nothing in my childhood had told me that anything like this was possible, let alone acceptable. It hurt, but in the end, my heart won. So I’m here to tell you that you can do it. You  _ can  _ believe, you  _ can  _ break free of the conditioning, the same one that made you feel like it wasn’t possible to love both man and woman.”

He hesitates for a second before returning my embrace. I bury my head in his broad chest with relief.

“I know I’ve told you this before,” he whispers. “But you’re the strongest person I’ve ever met. You’ve got a will as tougj as diamond, Hua the Relentless. I suppose that’s why I’ve always put it to you to shoulder my burdens with me, because you’re the only one with the grit to do it. That’s why you’re the hero of the Empire.”

“Stop it!” I protest, tears brimming in my eyes in a distinctly  _ not  _ heroic way. “Now come on, we should probably do something about the two men we knocked unconscious.”

The journey to the Imperial City becomes much more pleasant. Things are not the same between us, but they are far better than how they were for the past month. Shang is still a little shier around me than he was when we were in the army together, and he acts even more uncomfortable than usual when I tell rude jokes or swear excessively, but he’s too kindhearted to treat me as lesser even if he thinks it. We meet all sorts of other travelers on the way, some of them even soldiers heading back home now that the emperor has declared our official victory. They are overjoyed at finding out we did not in fact perish in the mountains, as most had believed. Being called Hua the Relentless doesn’t have quite a shine to it nowadays. I’d rather be known for something other than acts of merciless violence, and I know my commander would agree with me. 

Once we come across a troop of dancers, and one of the performers, a silky-haired youth that manages to hang perfectly on the border between man and woman, flirts profusely with Shang. He turns red and is incapable of saying anything while I double over laughing. Afterwards the sylph approaches me and says, “I don’t know why you haven’t made a move on that hunk yourself. You must be the worst sort of masochist.”

When I try to protest they raise a delicate finger and smirk at me.

“No point denying it. Us folk have a way of detecting each other, you know. Like recognises like.”

I smile suddenly, unused to being in the presence of someone like me. It is incredibly affirming, to know that I’m not alone. 

“We’re still coming to terms with each other. Well, he’s still coming to terms with me. I’m afraid I’ve thrown him off a little bit.”

Their smile widens, and we both exchange mischievous glances.

“I’ve been there,” they say. “Don’t worry about it too much, baby. The ones who can’t handle a little something extra don’t deserve you anyway, but he doesn’t seem like one of those. There will always be ones who will want you as you are, and those are the ones that matter. Good luck.”

They give me a dainty wave and saunter off. I stand there for a moment, basking on the high of solidarity.

My happiness is short lived. After about a week of traveling, during which we have polished off nearly all the food the friendly villagers packed for us, we reach the familiar main road that leads to the Imperial City of Datong, and I yet again fall into despondence. I’ve already made arrangements to meet up with Zhang Wei, but there are still too many reckonings on the horizon. How long will this tenuous new peace with my commander last, for example? What purpose do I have in life beyond being a soldier? 

And perhaps most pressingly, how can I keep living as Hua Ping? Returning to my village and marrying as my parents would’ve wanted is impossible on so many levels, not to mention that the idea of donning women’s robes and returning to that unfulfilling life of sitting quietly while men speak over me makes me dizzy. I haven’t written to my parents in forever, as distracted as I was with my duties as general. Probably rather lame of me, what with the whole reason I joined the military being to save my father, who I now never even write to. But going to see him, even if I love him enough to risk my life for him, will inevitably end in pain. My parents called me Hua Ping in their past letters to me in order to avoid exposing me, but there is no doubt in my mind that to them I am Hua Mulan, their beautiful little magnolia blossom. I can’t imagine Mother would be very pleased that I’ve rejected the name they chose for me. My goal in life seems to be breaking as many of the teachings of Confucius as possible.

The walls of the city are in view by now, concealing all but the highest rooftops from view. They are a reminder that I am going to have to make some impossibly big decisions very soon. Feeling queasy, I tell Shang I must attend to something personal and slip off into the tall grass by the side of the road that has been left just for such purposes. I crouch for a while in the mud, my slinged arm making the position a bit more complicated than usual, but when the nausea doesn’t recede I give up and wobble my way back up. Just as I turn to go, I catch a glimpse of something red flashing away through the tall grass, like the tail of a snake. Something about the moment strikes me as oddly familiar, though I can’t recall what. 

I step back out onto the wide road, glancing around for Shang and the goat cart through the stream of travelers making their way too and from the city. He’s waiting with a hand on his hip.

“You holding up alright?” he asks as I waddle over, wiping away the cold sweat beading up on my fore head. I offer him what I hope is a reassuring smile but is probably a panicked grimace.

“I’m fine. Now what do you — “

I forget whatever I was just about to say when I spot another flash of red disappearing into the cloud. A pulsing in the back of my head is telling me that this is somehow significant, that I need to do something. Considering that I’m at such a loss right now, even the most dubious of divine messages might be worth following. 

“Hold on a moment,” I tell Shang, before pushing past a party of teapot merchants. He follows after me, catching my wrist.

“Ping, what are you doing?” 

I pull free of him and continue onwards.

“I just...have a feeling, ok? Humor me for a moment.”

He sighs but continues after me without attempting to hinder my progress again. 

I chase the flash of red through the crowd, never quite managing to catch up with it. It darts around a musician with a dancing monkey and I lose sight of it. I force my way around several protesting travelers, but it seems to be gone for good this time. I have just given up and come to a halt when someone crashes into me. I clutch my left arm as pain lances through it.

“Ow! What the heavens are you doing, Mister? Don’t just stand there! Move!”

The stranger pats down his ruffled hair in frustration. He’s just a boy, no older than I was when I went off to war, but he’s pulling a little wagon piled high with trinkets and his sandaled feet are caked with the grime of a long journey. When he glares at me I am struck with sudden familiarity. That strong jaw, those full lips and ears that stick a little bit too far out from his head…

He raises an eyebrow out me.

“What’s your problem? Do I have something on my face?”

I just continue to stare. I must be wrong. This can’t be him. It would be too great of a coincidence to run into him here. Unless the red I saw was indeed some fate guiding me…

A warm hand touches my shoulder.

“Is something the matter?” Shang asks, politely directing the impatient people waiting for us to keep walking to go around us. “Maybe we should take this somewhere else, where we won’t be blocking traffic. Yes, Ping?”

I shake my head to clear the daze.

“Are you Hua Yao Er?” I ask the boy. Shock, followed quickly by alarm and then suspicion, flickers across his face. He narrows his eyes.

“That is in fact my name. But who are you?”

“Oh, gods,” I murmur faintly. Noticing the expressions of the people around me, I take a breath to steady myself and turn to the boy with my shoulders squared.

“It’s been a long time, hasn’t it? I’m not surprised you don’t remember me.” I extend a hand to the bewildered child. “I’m Hua Ping, your big brother.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here I am again to offer my thanks! It's wild to think that there are people out there who are seriously willing to read nearly 50,000 words written by me of all people. I've learned my lesson by now so I won't offer a time estimate for the final chapter, but if you have any other questions about this work then just send an ask to my tumblr ratman2000 and I'll get back to you. See you soon?


	5. True to Your Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After much delay and procrastination, it's finally here! Well, sort of. This (probably) isn't the final draft. Buuut anyway, here we are, at the final chapter! This has been such a journey. Thank you to everyone that made it this far. Trans rights!!  
> cw: extreme sappiness because Disney Romance, brief reference to Mulan II, and(more seriously) an unaccepting parent and brief mention of forced marriage/implied dubcon(not involving main characters).

“Did he ever...say anything about me? In the end?” I ask, unable to keep a waver out of my voice.  
I’m sitting in a tiny restaurant in the Imperial City across from a young man I know to be my brother, and a few moments ago he delivered some news that ripped the heart from my chest.  
Yao Er shifts uneasily, his eyes dark with recent pain.  
“Māmā was the one who was with him. I was off helping Uncle Fang with his new business for a few days, so I didn’t know until I got back.” His lower lip trembles slightly. It is clear that he is trying his hardest to look strong in front of us, but seeing him teetering on the edge of grief like this I can’t help but think how young he is, how his face is just as innocent and untouched as it was ten years ago.  
I take a steadying breath of my own. Ten years of horror and violence have taught — or rather forced — me to adopt a more stoic exterior, but it has not left me prepared for the sucking void that opens in my chest.  
“He didn’t suffer,” Yao Er blurts, folding his hands in his lap. “Māmā said it was peaceful. He’d been sick for such a long time, you know, and towards the end he was getting nightmares worse than ever. I think he was waiting for it.”  
I can imagine how it would’ve happened — Mother busy in the kitchen, Father settling down into his favourite chair, cane in hand. A gentle smile on his face as he finally heard the voices of his ancestors and knew his pain was over. Just envisioning that makes it difficult for me to breathe. A warm hand on my shoulder makes me turn to look at Shang. His gentle eyes crinkle as he looks back, a silent condolence. Yao Er glances between us before continuing,  
“He did mention you, though. Before that. Māmā would always get upset when he did, that’s how I remember it. Bàba would say, ‘You know, Yao Er, you’ve got a big sibling off in the army who would be so proud to see you this big.’ Or, ‘Work hard, Yao Er, your big sibling is a general! Don’t you want to bring honour to our family too?’”  
He stops abruptly to wipe at the snot running from his nose, and I do what is expected of an older brother and put a comforting hand on his arm.  
“It’s alright,” I say, though it takes all my strength to keep my voice steady. “You don’t need to say anything.”  
Yao Er stares at me, still fighting back tears.  
“What did you do to Māmā?” he whispers. “How did you hurt her so badly that she never even mentions you?”  
I open my mouth to speak but cannot find the words. Guilt bubbles in my stomach — guilt from losing touch with my parents, from not being there for my mother when my father passed and to help her in her three years of mourning, guilt that slips its way into my ear and tells me over and over again to stop lying and to tell this poor lost child what I really am.  
I shake my head. No, I will not let those thoughts get to me at a time like this.  
“I hate to say this, dìdì, but you wouldn’t understand.”

I give the owner of the restaurant the last of the copper coins the northern villagers gifted me and walk my little brother back to his cart, which he insists on dealing with himself.  
“Will you be headed home after you sell all this?” I ask, gesturing to his wares. Yao Er shrugs. He’s still shaky from our earlier conversation.  
“I guess.”  
“Well. I might just see you there, then.” I glance at Shang, who watches from a distance, not keen to interfere with our family affairs.  
Yao Er picks up his cart and trudges off, barely sparing me a backwards glance. The moment he disappears into the crowd I sink to my knees, all the grief that I’d been putting aside while I comforted him finally fighting its way to the surface. It is dull and suffocating, pressing at my chest until my ribcage is on the verge of collapse. My throat swells closed so I cannot speak, only clutch at the cobblestones as silent sobs wrack my body painfully.  
It’s as if these twelve years never even happened and I’m just a naive child again, crying in the dirt because my father has been called off to war. Back then I was acting on my female upbringing, giving into tears and hysteria, and I know that as a man I should not be putting on such a disgusting display of emotions — but to keep all this inside would kill me. The tears running down from my one good eye have become more than just tears for my father. I choke on the terror that has been dogging me since the end of the war came into sight. What am I supposed to do now? That’s the problem with climbing ranks — you begin to lose the comfort of having orders to follow, a plan already laid out, and must become the one making them.  
“Hua Ping…”  
Shang stands beside me, his broad back shielding me from the stream of passersby.  
“I understand what you’re feeling right now,” he says. “And I know you’re more than strong enough to face this.”  
Anger flares in me again and I glare up at him.  
“You do not understand how I feel,” I snarl out. “You’ve said so yourself.”  
His eyes furrow in frustration and he crouches down.  
“Ping.”  
I flinch away from his touch.  
“And not just that. Don’t try to tell me about how you’ve lost your father too, you’re a fucking Buddhist. I don’t get to take comfort in knowing my father is a cow or something now. His souls have separated, and even if he’s looking down on me from the heavens or whatever, he’s still gone. From this world, at least.”  
It hits me again as I say it. My father. The man who taught me to fight, who would carry my sister and me on his back to the market and buy us seed cakes. The man who would sometimes cry to himself when he thought nobody could hear him, who had been broken by the very war that made him a hero. I am here, now, with one eye gone and an arm in a sling, not to mention the crushed ribs from my bindings, because I loved him so much that I would die for him, and I couldn’t even be bothered to write home for the last year or so.  
Shang gently pushes me into a sitting position.  
“Yes, my father raised me with the teachings of Bodhidharma, but no amount of meditation and reading the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra could’ve made the moment we found that village any less devastating,” he says softly. “You remember that, don’t you? I was trying my hardest not to show it, but it felt like someone had cut out my lungs.”  
I manage at last to catch my breath. The worst of my pain has begun to fade until it is just a haze in the back of my mind, constant but momentarily sufferable. Shang is watching me carefully, his expression somewhere between patience and carefully composed calm, and I remind myself that Shang’s stability is not as effortless as it seems. He’s as lost as me, just a little better at saving face. Military school brats, huh.  
I rub my itchy, tear-stained face.  
“Of course I remember. That was the day I really become a soldier.” The memory, now distant enough that it doesn’t feel like I’m going to drown in it, is clear in my mind. “More so than when I first put on the uniform. Or killed a man.”  
Shang laughs quietly. “Yeah, that. I remember my first, too. I thought I was going to throw up. But I learned to cope.” He grips my hand with a desperation that startles me. “It’s amazing what we’ve lived through, Ping. What we’ve endured. I honestly can’t believe we haven’t ended up dead in a ditch at least twice by now.”  
“We sure are two hardy sons of bitches,” I agree. “Now, Li, could we maybe find an inn or something? People are starting to give us weird looks.”

We eventually find lodgings in the market district of the city. Shang tries to tell me that we should go pay our respects to the Emperor and stay in the Officers’ Chambers in the Imperial Barracks, but I’m not about to march up to the palace and inform the court of my miraculous survival after being on the road for weeks. Even outside the Inner City you have to have more than a few copper coins to spare if you want a room, so we have to sell off the cart and goats the kindly villagers gave us. Our room has a mat and a wash basin and not much else, so it falls a bit short of what we would have in the Imperial Palace, but it serves its purpose. I rush over to the water basin to wash the dust from my face, untying my eyepatch and throwing it to the floor. Shang goes over to the mat and sits with a heavy sigh.  
He watches me as I pull my hair down from its top knot and pour cold water over it. I push the damp hair out of my face and peer into the bronze mirror, and the face peering back at me sends a twist of displeasure through my gut. There are, unsurprisingly, a limited number of mirrors on a battlefield, but every time I come into the city I am greeted with a thousand reflections of my own stupid face. The Imperial Palace is the worst offender. Who needs mirrors in their corridors? Who is going to be standing in the halls of the Imperial Palace and checking their hair?  
Even with the scar over my eye, I look ridiculously soft. My cheeks are smooth in the way no man’s should be at this age — though I admit I have no keen interest in shaving — and my lips are too full. Lush lips might look good on a man like Li Shang, who has the body to make up for his pretty face, but on someone three heads shorter than him? Less so. Not to mention my stupid ears, which stick out like a monkey’s when I have my hair up. Zhang has told me more than once that I’m depriving the female population by being into men, but why a woman would want to marry a man with softer features than herself is beyond me.  
“Feeling a bit out of it?”  
“What?”  
I turn, dripping water onto the floor, to look at Shang. He’s lying on the mat, propped up on his elbow.  
“Are you feeling...like a, uh, girl, Ping?”  
My face heats up. “Wh — How the hell?”  
He makes a face as if assessing whether it’s appropriate or not before smiling.  
“You get this look sometimes, it’s like — I don’t know how to explain it. Like someone pricked you with a needle, maybe, and now you’re deflating. Before I couldn’t understand what would drain all the confidence out of a force of nature like you, but now that I know about—” He makes a vague gesture. “I guessed that you stopped feeling like Hua Ping for a moment.”  
I let a breath out from between my teeth. “That’s far more astute than literally any comment you’ve made on that topic before, but that’s not...exactly how it works.”  
“How does it feel, then?” he asks, genuinely curious.  
He looks so eager to listen, so receptive, that I want to tell him, but how do I explain something like this? It’s not like it always comes in the same form, that it’s the same as it was ten, or five, or two years ago, even a day ago. For something so constant, it’s also so nebulous, so intangible.  
“It depends,” I reply vaguely.  
“On what?”  
“On the day. On the season. On my mood. Sometimes I forget that I don’t have a man’s body. Sometimes I forget that I have a body at all. Sometimes it’s all I can think about.”  
I adjust my undershirt so that I can see the bandaging around my damaged shoulder.  
“Have you ever had this mental picture of someone in your head, and then you actually meet them for the first time and they look so different from what you pictured them as that for a second you’re just thrown off?”  
Shang rolls back to get a better look at me.  
“I guess.”  
“Well, sometimes I feel that way when I see myself. I’m caught in this moment of ‘wait, that’s not what you’re supposed to look like, is it?’ I’m more surprised than anything, that there’s this stranger looking back at me. And sometimes…”  
I let out a soft sound of pain as I struggle to get out of my tunic with one arm, before eventually giving up and glaring at my reflection in frustration. “Sometimes I look at my body and all I can feel is disgust. For a while I thought I was just upset about my body because it put me in danger — like what if I got discovered? Would I be executed? Or what if some man tried to — ?” I shudder, remembering how terrified I was of my own weakness compared to the other soldiers. “But at some point I realised that didn’t really justify how sick it made me to look down at my chest when I took it out of the bindings, even with the smell. That’s what I don’t get about men. How could you find these lumps of flesh attractive? They’re like growths.”  
Shang shakes his head, his smile mischievous.  
“They’re so much more than lumps of flesh, Ping, you uneducated swine. BUT.” He raises a finger when I start to protest, concerned with where he might be going with this. “I also happen to find flat chests very, very attractive too — at least when they belong to a pretty boy.”  
“Well, if you’re looking for one here, you’re out of luck.”  
I attempt this time to slide the tunic down over my shoulder, but all that does is start to tear the fabric.  
“Ping, you insufferable idiot. Let me help you with that.”  
Shang gets up and, despite my shouts, manages to yank the tunic over my head without hurting my shoulder. My face heats with embarrassment at my uselessness, and maybe a little of something else as well. We stand there for a moment, him holding my tunic and me half-naked in my undershirt, before he tilts his head and smiles.  
“If you want to talk about it, any of it, then tell me. Now it doesn’t have to just be me blabbering about all my problems, hmmm? We can both be honest.”  
I hadn’t even considered that. It does feel nice to talk about this to someone when I have spent so many years with it just inside my head. And since Shang has always been the one coming to me in the past…  
“Well, good timing,” I smirk. “I told you before that I can’t keep shouldering burdens for the both of us, and that’s especially true now.” My damaged shoulder creaks when I stretch it, just for dramatic effect.  
Shang shakes his head. “You’re too much.” He pauses for a moment, his gaze flicking from the bandages on my shoulder to the ones binding my chest peeking through the low neck of the undershirt. “As for our, uh, talk, is there anything I...need to say?”  
There are several things that come to mind, things that I want him to tell me, but they won’t mean anything if they aren’t of his own accord. I stare at the floor.  
“No. It’s nice if you just listen.”  
He lets out a sigh. It seems as if he has been holding his breath, treading carefully through this unfamiliar territory. Sometimes I find Shang far too forgiving and wish he had a liang more conviction when it comes to personal matters, but if he’s going to let his anger go on this one then by the gods, I’ll let him.  
We settle back to back on the mat, his body warm against mine. Sharing beds (and sometimes a bit more than that) is common practise in the military, but it has been such a long time since I was a footsoldier, huddling against my companions for warmth as the northern winds blew around us. It is not a sensation that I would expect to miss, given the anxiety that I would be discovered such sleeping arrangements gave me, but feeling my commander so close to me sparks a longing in my gut. I yearn to be close to someone in a way that does not make me so painfully aware of my own body. It should be easy! I love men and I have a woman’s body, and yet — the gods have made it so that all I really want is just out of reach. It does not make me sad or self pitying, as it might’ve before I became a soldier. More than anything, it makes me angry. I fall asleep with my nails digging into the palms of my hands. 

To say that I am not particularly eager to go before the emperor is an understatement. The commander and I get ourselves cleaned up as best we can, but we still look more like beggars than war heroes returning home to pledge allegiance before the Son of Heaven. Shang’s face, however, transitions from weary and travel-worn to stern and soldierly the moment we come into view of the high palace gates. The Imperial Guard shift into position and bar our paths with their long ji as we approach.  
“Halt!” the leader cries, stepping forward to confront us. “Who goes there?”  
Shang nods his head curtly, ever the military-academy brat.  
“I am Commander Li Shang of the Imperial Army, and beside me is General Hua Ping. You may have heard of him as, ‘Hua the Relentless.’”  
The guard’s gaze dart suspiciously over at me. I square my jaw and look him straight in the eye.  
“We have come at last to claim our victory over the Rouran in the far north,” Shang continues. “Certain events kept us from returning with the rest of the Imperial Army, but I am sure His Imperial Majesty will be pleased to hear of our arrival.”  
The guard stares for a moment longer before nodding brusquely. “Alright, sirs. Wait here for just a moment.” His men move aside as he passes through the servant’s gate set into the wall and disappears onto the palace grounds.  
He returns shortly, with two men by his side. One I recognise by his uniform to be the Captain of the Imperial Guard, but the other…  
“Jiangjun!” Lieutenant General Maa exclaims, surprise evident on his face for a moment before he bows low, his hair nearly brushing the tiled road. “And Commander Li as well,” he adds, almost an afterthought. “It is good to see you two are well. I have heard murmurs of your survival, but it is foolish to take stock in the gossip of soldiers.”  
I gesture for him to rise, and the slight smile on his face when he does sends a bolt of surprise through my heart.  
“Well, for once they were not mistaken,” I reply shakily, emotion suddenly clawing its way up my throat. “We’re here at last, even if it took us a month or so. And you, Maa? Are you well?”  
He dips his head humbly. “Now that I see you here before me, I would say so. The men will be so very pleased to hear of this. But I digress — you have come to kneel before His Imperial Majesty, yes? Let us lead you to him.”  
Maa motions for us to follow as he and the Captain of the Guard turn to guide us towards the palace. Shang and I follow slowly, glancing back at the guards as we pass. Maa keeps up a steady stream of conversation as we walk, filling us in on all we have missing while I was off petting goats. He is not trying particularly hard to hide the excitement in his voice. I start to tune him out after a bit, my usual worries starting to fog up my mind, but I catch the words, ‘war heroes’ and ‘saviours of the empire’ a few times. After all that I’ve been through, a title seems rather dull.  
There is a momentary holdup as the Captain of the Guard speaks with the soldiers standing outside of the emperor’s audience room, but before the sun sets we hear that the emperor is ready to receive us. I think vaguely to myself that a few years ago, it would’ve taken days or even months for us to be able to hold audience with him. Sweet, sweet hierarchy.  
The Son of Heaven is as regal as ever on his golden throne, but as with every other time I have kowtowed before him all I can picture is the frightened man my friends and I saved all those years ago. And those friends… I bite my lip, for once glad that my forehead is pressed into the ground, so no one sees the emotion twist my face. Nostalgia is a powerful drug.  
“Commander Li. General Hua. I had heard from my advisors that you had perished in the battle at the wall.”  
I raise my head to see the emperor peering down at me. With disgust I notice Chi Fu beside him. For a few months now I have been able to avoid the sight of his smug face, but sadly no longer. He narrows his eyes at me.  
“General Hua,” the emperor says again. “I remember well the first time I saw you. It was not under the best of circumstances, as you know, but despite your foolhardiness it was clear to me that you were a noble and ambitious man.”  
I stare back at him. Even after all this time I still have no idea how all this court nonsense works, so I lower my head again and hope that is what is expected of me.  
“And as I see you now, as different as you appear, I know that you are still such a man. Unit Commander Liang Luoyang tells me that you were the one to chase Shan Yu from the battlefield, that you rode him down and nearly gave your life in felling him .”  
“I wasn’t the only one,” I blurt. As clueless as I am, I’m still fairly sure talking back to the emperor like this is not on the list of Acceptable Court Behaviours. But hells, I’m Hua the fucking Relentless, and when have I ever been one to hold my tongue? Now isn’t the time for me to start being rational. “In truth, your majesty, I was not the one who killed Shan Yu. He would have defeated me had Commander Li not rescued me.” I turn my good eye so I can see Shang, who still has his forehead pressed to the ground. He glances back, an embarrassed smile tugging at the corners of his lips.  
“Very well then,” says the emperor. “Rise, both of you.”  
We do as we are commanded, keeping our eyes on the ground. I hold my breath as the emperor gives some quick instructions to his advisors. I am becoming increasingly more aware of the court assembled around us, warlords and courtiers watching eagerly.  
“Come forward,” the emperor commands. I walk hesitantly over to the platform that holds the throne, not daring to look back up until his slippered feet appear before me. It is probably against some rule or other to look the Son of Heaven directly in the eye, but when I do, I see pride gleaming there. There is a weight as a pendant lowers around my neck. I stare at it, near delirious.  
“Li Shang. Hua Ping. You are the heroes of China. You have saved us all.”  
The throne room erupts with cheers. 

“Why did you do that?” Shang hisses.  
I look up at him innocently. “What?”  
“Tell the emperor I killed Shan Yu?”  
It seems obvious. “Because it’s the truth,” I say, a touch confused. “Was I just supposed to pretend I did all the work?”  
Shang sighs and puts his head in his hands. “Of course. I forgot who I was talking to. You don’t give yourself enough credit, Ping.”  
“I’m giving myself the credit I actually earned. Is that not ‘enough?’”  
We are standing in the Officer’s Wing, just outside of Shang’s suite. Everything — the walls, the rug, the plush cushions on the benches — is a rather gory shade of red. For the first time in forever, I was actually able to treat myself to a private bath, though I didn’t have the dexterity to change my bandages or clothe myself properly given my arm, and Shang spent longer than necessary fussing over me.  
“It was just...extremely embarrassing.”  
“Me. Embarrassing. That’s a first.”  
Shang watches as I trail my finger through the dust collecting on the rim of some strangely shaped vase.  
“You’re acting unusually irreverent tonight,” he comments. “You have something planned?”  
I turn away from him so he cannot see the smirk creeping onto my face.  
“Oh, nothing. Just going out to eat with Zhang Wei.”  
The choking sound he makes fills me with an evil satisfaction.  
“By the buddha and all the gods, Ping. You sure don’t waste time,” he mutters.  
He’s pouting ever so slightly, like a huffy child. Here it is, that same old petty jealousy rearing its head. Why can’t the two people I care about most in the world just get along? When Wei isn’t calling Shang a try-hard bootlicker, Shang(usually the reasonable one in these situations) has to be weird about us being such close friends.  
“Are you going to tell him about yourself?” he asks.  
“What? No!” I exclaim, suddenly a bit rattled. It is something I have been chewing on for a rather long time. Now is not the moment for Shang to come butting into it.  
“Ever?” He raises an eyebrow.  
“No,” I mutter. It’s the closest I’ve come to a resolution. “I can’t. As much as I love the man, that isn’t going to end up anywhere nice. Just look at how you reacted.” I jab a finger at him. “You’re my godsdamned best case scenario, and you still give me shit about how you ‘don’t understand’ but will ‘do what it takes to make me happy.’” I suck in a breath, trying and failing to not get worked up. “I’m not ready to hear something about how our friendship isn’t ‘proper’ or how ‘indecent’ it is again.”  
Shang looks a little guilty. “Alright, alright, I get it.”  
I lean closer, narrowing my eyes. “Do you? You get this is just two friends, reuniting after being apart for far too long, not a maiden with her lover or whatever indecency that would warrant your jealousy?”  
He puts up his hands, like he wants to touch me but isn’t sure if he’s allowed to. Good, because I’m not sure I’d let him at the moment. “Ping, Ping. How many times do I have to say it to get through to you? I don’t think you’re — I don’t see you as — a girl. Boy, girl, whatever, I still — “ He cuts himself off abruptly, and a door slams shut behind his eyes. “But you don’t want to hear this right now. Have fun, okay?”  
I cross my arms, my excitement at seeing Wei able to overcome my only mild irritation with Shang.  
“Thanks. I think I will.”

Even in the Inner City, I draw looks in my officer’s robes. Perhaps the passersby take note of my eyepatch and short stature and recognise me as one of the soldiers honoured as a hero of the empire, or maybe they’re just staring because the recent declaration of peace is on their minds. A longsword bounces at my hip, the sheath beautifully decorated with ornate patterns of gold, but it is more ornamental than usual given my current state. Even as I hold my head high I am painfully aware of the limpness of my shoulder. I would prefer to be more anonymous both because I’m more comfortable in a foot soldier's tunic than this finery, and also that I do anything foolish such as, say, trip over my own feet (it happens sometimes), then I wouldn’t be receiving as much attention. But alas.  
Zhang Wei arranged for us to meet at a fine tea house, one we had frequented in the past when I had first started climbing the ranks. The welcoming glow of the paper lanterns out front reminds me better times. Inside it is lively, though not nearly as much as the crowded local places that we would stop at during a march. Located as it is in the Inner City, most of the clientele are older, sophisticated gentlemen, sipping languidly from dainty teacups or playing go. My eye settles on a far table, where someone neither old nor sophisticated is waving to me.  
“Hua Ping!” Wei exclaims as I approach. “You look like absolute shit, brother.” He is smiling, but perhaps not as widely as he would like to. A smile spreads across my own lips, though in truth the sight of my truest friend after so long a time makes me want to burst into tears. Knowing Wei, he probably feels the same, but he’d rather die than let on that he feels emotions other than sarcasm and irritation.  
“It is good to see you too, brother,” I reply, taking a seat on the mat opposite him. Just as my eye darts over to the other two guests at the table, my friend says, “Hua Ping, I would like you to meet Chin Zedong. He’s the eldest brother of my lovely wife here. Of course, you already know Mei.”  
Chin bows his head in greeting. Mei does the same, though I get the impression that she does it more to avoid meeting my eye.  
“It is an honour to meet a hero such as yourself, General Hua,” Chin says. “Zhang Wei has told our family much of your exploits.”  
My face heats and I hunch my good shoulder.  
“My thanks, Mr. Chin. I am equally honoured to be acquainted with a member from such a respected family as the Chins.” I reply stiffly. “But there’s, uh, no need. I’m not here as a general. Let us pass this evening without formalities.” I look desperately to Wei, who just shrugs.  
Unlike the rest of us, he sits in a wheeled chair, bending over towards us.  
“How’s your leg?” I ask.  
Something flashes across my friend’s face — pain, frustration, it’s impossible to tell — before he responds. “Just as useless as ever. Thankfully my honoured father in law commissioned an inventor to rig up this contraption for me.” He slaps the armrest of his wheeled chair. “It does make it rather hard to be a proper father, though.”  
His gaze goes to his wife, and for a moment there is such emotion there that I am caught off guard. Zhang Wei, the man who does anything he can to maintain his smokescreen of jokes and sarcasm, looking at someone with such naked affection. A twinge goes through my heart that I cannot help but hate myself for. It is unreasonable of me to expect to keep my friends all to myself.  
“How is Da Ping?”  
I have to ask, of course, after the brat that carries my name. It was a choice widely protested both by the mother and namesake, but as the father Wei carried the final say and did not back down. The only compromise I managed to get out of him was an agreement to use a character that didn't mean 'vase.'  
My friend gestures to his wife, giving her permission to speak. Mei does not lift her head, but she says in a gentle, deferential voice, “He is quite well. His father and grandparents fret over him constantly, but he is as rosy-cheeked and happy a child as one could ask for.”  
“He’s quite a fighter, too,” Chin adds, smiling at his sister. “His cries are stronger than a tiger’s. I’d say that one day he’ll grow up to be as great a warrior as his namesake.”  
“And his father!” Wei whines. “Let’s not forget I’m the one he got that fighting spirit from!”  
Chin rolls his eyes at his brother-in-law. “And his father, of course.”  
I smile stiffly as this little family scene plays out, Chin and Zhang Wei keeping up the conversation as Mei sits quietly, still staring at the floor. Her presence unnerves me slightly. Why Wei brought her here I’m not entirely sure. Certainly none of the other clients have dragged their wives along with them, but then again Zhang Wei has never been one to care much about what others do. He’s certainly not a conventional husband. The marriage of Zhang Wei and Chin Mei is a popular story in our division, as their tale sounds like something out of an ancient love ballad. A soldier, nothing but a country conscript, and the daughter of one of the most successful merchant families in Datong, falling madly in love and refusing to be parted. Mei does not look exactly starstruck now, meek and silent as she is. That is what you would be like, my head tells me. If you had not gone off to save your father. Worse than that, even, because you would not have had the fortune of marrying the man you loved. And who would that be?  
I look aware from her, focusing instead on the faces of my friend and his brother-in-law.  
“I wish I could’ve invited Yao and the others,” I sigh, tracing my finger guilty along the rim of my teacup. Yet more I left behind on my climb to the top, people I forgot when all that was on my stupid, cowardly mind was Li Shang. “But I couldn’t get ahold of them. No addresses to send my letters to. I don’t suppose you know what happened to them?”  
For all I know, they could be dead, fallen in battle years ago. But the expression on Wei’s face gives me hope.  
“Do I know what happened to them?” he asks. “Ping, how could you not?”  
I lick my lips nervously. “Did I miss something?”  
“Did you ever. While you were off at your officer’s meetings, the rest of us were out living life.” He takes a long sip from his cup, clearly pleased at the anticipation on our faces. “Our boys did nothing less than bed the emperor’s own concubines — somehow even obtained their hands in marriage.”  
Mei’s face twists with displeasure at his crude words but remains silent.  
Chin laughs. “Oh, so you’re talking about those three. I remember when that was all high society here in Datong would talk about. But the story I heard said that the women were the emperor’s daughters.”  
“If they were his daughters, I’m fairly sure they would be dead,” I say. “Those three seem to have the favour of the gods, considering how they’ve managed to not wind up in a ditch by now. Power to them.”  
“Good ol’ Ling and the boys,” Wei agrees, slamming his cup down on the table with most force than necessary. “Alright.” He turns to give Chin a significant look. “ I need to, uh, take care of a few things. Can you escort me?” Wei glances back at me. “Normally I have a caretaker help me with this sort of thing,” he explains, the barely perceptible tightness in his voice betraying his discomfort. “But I didn’t want to ruin the evening. You know.”  
I watch my friend being wheeled off, knowing he would spurn my pity. Just look at us, I think, my hand brushing my eyepatch. What war has turned us into. Like a bunch of broken old crockery. I turn, startled, when Mei clears her throat. She regards me out of the corner of her eye.  
“I am sorry, Mr. Hua, for whatever shortcoming of mine has caused you to dislike,” she says softly.  
I stare at her, not sure whether I should be surprised or angry or just embarrassed.  
“I don’t dislike you,” I reply lamely, though the words are so blatantly false.  
She shakes her head. “I understand,” she says, and I see now that she has the hems of her robes balled up in her fists. “My husband tells me that you do not have many companions in this world, but you treasure the friends you do have dearly. I know how much my husband means to you. And I’m sorry...I’m sorry if I feel like I’m taking him away from you.”  
She stares at her knees, face twisted in misery. I sit in silence, no idea how to respond and praying she isn’t going to cry. What is someone supposed to do when a woman starts crying? It has been over a decade since I’ve socialised with women, and even before then I never learned how to speak to them as a man.  
“It’s not your fault,” I say, placing a hand on the table. There’s probably some law, unspoken or otherwise, about touching your best friend’s wife, even when trying to comfort her. “Wei’s just fulfilling his duty and raising a family, as the ancestors intended, and I can’t be mad at either of you just because I’ve failed at that.” She, at long last, peeks up at me, her large eyes glistening. “It’s not your shortcoming that are the problem. They’re mine.” I try to bite back the emotion in the last few words, but my voice still rises more than I’d like it to.  
Mei smiles at me, that dainty little smile that women are trained to do. I wish that it did not spur such deep discomfort from me. Though perhaps this is not solely my problem, but rather one that arises when men and women are not allowed to mix except in marriage. How are men supposed to understand women, to feel comfortable around them, to know how to talk to them, if they are not allowed to work beside them? Men mock the weakness of women, yet I myself know that the limitations of the female body, when put to the test, are not so far from a man’s.  
“I suppose it is hard for you, seeing all your friends getting married and hearing them speak the praises of their wives,” Mei says. “But do not worry, Mr Hua. A man like you is sure to find a wife, and with your military honours, I am sure you can have your pick of all the most beautiful women in the empire.”  
If only she knew how much worse she is making this. I grit out a smile and nod.  
“Thank you, Mrs. Zhang. Of course.”  
She looks at me, like perhaps she has seen the dull misery hidden just behind my overly bright smile, but like a good wife she does not say a thing.

We part ways well into the night, having moved from the tea shop to a full restaurant and, after seeing Mei home in a family sedan, helped ourselves to plenty of sorghum liquor. The streets back to the Imperial barracks are quiet, save the distant sounds of carriages and street merchants still advertising their late-night wares. Wei stop directs Chin to stop pushing him just before we come into view of the gate.  
“Ping,” he mumbles, slurring ever so slightly with drink. “It was good to see you, brother, really good.”  
I grin back, this one true and warm. “You too, Wei. I really missed you. And Mr. Chin.” I attempt a little bow, but my tipsiness prevents me. “It was lovely meeting you.”  
He bobs. “Likewise.”  
Wei looks like he wants to say something, before pushing himself roughly from the chair and taking one staggering step forward before falling into me, crushing me into an embrace. I wince as his weight goes to my shoulder, but wrap one arm firmly around him nonetheless.  
“I was so fucking worried about you,” he murmurs against my ear, cheek pressed against my own. “When the troops came marching back into the city, but no one knew what had happened to you — gods, Ping, I thought you had finally died.”  
“Come on,” I reply. “Takes more than some Rouran to kill me.” But my hand is gripping his back, holding him there and feeling the warmth of his body against mine because gods, it’s been such a long time since I have held someone and not been crushed by the fact that this might be the last night. No more. The war, for a while, is over, because of me, because of Shang, because of the thousands of brave, faceless men that spilled their blood so that people like me could be named the heroes.  
Wei laughs weakly, the movement sending vibrations through my body. “Of course. Sorry, forgot who I was talking to for a moment.  
I clutch him, hold my friend as close to me as possible, because he’s here in my arms and I’m not going to lose him, not to war and not to his family or whatever else might pull him away from me. This, in the swirling pool of uncertainty that is my future, is the only thing I am sure of.  
“What am I going to do with myself?” I ask him as he pulls away, still leaning on my arm for support. Wei shakes his head, and in those eyes is the same unadulterated emotion that I saw when he looked at Mei, the fierce love that shows on his face when he talks about his son.  
“You’re going to have to figure that out yourself,” he says. “But whatever you choose, just know you’re not alone. You’ve got me, you’ve got the boys, wherever they are, and hell, I know you’ve got Commander Kissass. You don’t have to shoulder everything yourself, Ping. We’ve got your back.”  
“Whatever did I do to deserve a friend like you?” I give his shoulder an affectionate squeeze, trying to hold back the tears that I am nowhere near drunk enough to have an excuse for.  
“Probably something really bad. The gods must’ve been quite offended.”  
He lowers himself awkwardly, painfully, back into the chair, and for the sake of his pride I do not offer any assistance. “See you around, Ping,” he says, giving a salute. “Try not to get executed or anything, okay? You still owe me a sesame roll from that rock skipping contest five years ago.”  
I grin boyishly back. “I make no promises.”

Shang seems less than impressed when I appear at his door, my cheeks still flush with drink.  
“How was it?” he asks as I push past him, as dryly as he can without being rude.  
“A bit strange.” I twirl around on the gold-embroidered rug. Another imperial luxury — even back home, the floors of my house were bare. “He brought his wife with him, for some reason.”  
Shang shakes his head, turning back from the door to face me. On a whim, my heart still singing from the high of being reunited with my friend, I go over to him and attempt to throw my arm over his shoulder. He responses a little stiffly, hesitating a moment before steadying me against him. I take comfort in his warmth, his sturdy form against mine.  
“And how much did you have to drink, Ping?” He regards me a touch reproachfully, so I scrunch my nose and glare back.  
“Not much. I’m not a light-weight, thank you.”  
“Sure.” His expression softens, and I cannot help but melt into those warm eyes of his. “I just...I’m a little worried what you might get up to when you’re, er, under the influence. If you might accidentally say or something...compromising.”  
Here it is again, Li Shang’s knack for ruining any moment between us. I begin to pull away from him, the same spark flaring up in me again. It’s been faster to catch fire these days; I can always feel that ember of old anger smoldering somewhere, just beneath my heart. Anger that built up over years of dealing with impotent bureaucracy and ceaseless, senseless violent, hatred that I foolishly nursed so I could have something to keep me going. Now that Shan Yu is dead, the blackness in my heart has no one to direct itself at. I feel like an old drunk, made belligerent and bitter from hard luck and cheap liquor. Yet another way that war and violence have poisoned me.  
“Gods damn it, Li Shang. How many more times do I have to have this conversation with you? I went for twelve fucking years with no one finding me out. Not only that — I survived a war. I didn’t become a general of the Imperial Army just for you to treat me like a child, fret over me like I’m some fragile — some fragile little girl!”  
There is no anger in his face, not even frustration. Only that old pain. That emotional nakedness that drew me to him one cold mountain night.  
“I know you’re strong, Ping, and you know that I know. But you’re not invulnerable. And as long as there’s some possibility of something happening to you, then I’m going to worry about you? Do I not have that right?”  
I remember him now, the night before the final battle, his eyes pleading with me. Him offering up concern, and me not having any idea what to give him in return. Then, I had still thought it necessary to keep up a wall between us, but now that everything is out between us, what is holding me back? It is written in his eyes, the same tenderness that he has looked at me with for all these years. The tenderness I did not allow myself to give back. Perhaps it is the drink still buzzing in my blood that makes me decide it — that I will no longer keep myself from taking what I want.  
Instead of replying, I step back towards him. He stares at me, open-eyed, as I cup his face with my hand and stand up on my toes, closing the space between us as I press my lips to his. The sensation is more heady than any alcohol, and I find myself leaning against him for support. Part of me expects him to pull away, to shove me, even. Part of me is terrified that he doesn’t want me, that whatever we held between us was broken when he first saw the bindings on my chest. I would not fault him for it, when even I do not understand this conviction of mine. Another part of me is scared that he will kiss me back; that maybe he does love me, but as a woman. It is wrong of me, but some secret, bitter corner in my heart wishes he was like me, and had no desire for women. Some small guarantee that when he looks at me he still sees Ping.  
In the end, he neither pushes me away nor kisses me back. He just stands there until I pull away for breath, a hand landing on my shoulder when I open my eyes and look up at him.  
“Ping,” he murmurs, and it is with no small amount of satisfaction that I notice the tinge to his bronze cheeks. My hand falls away from his face. What have I done? Good old Hua Ping, making more life-ruining rash decisions. I can’t think of anything to say except, “Well?”  
Shang still seems a bit bewildered. “You’re sure you’re not drunk?” he asks.  
“Yes, you idiot.” I smack him lightly on the cheek I had just been touching.  
“Hmmm.” He purses his lips. At least he doesn’t look annoyed, or afraid. The fact that he hasn’t run away yet is also probably a good sign. “Ping,” he repeats, as if preparing himself. “I don’t want to mislead you.”  
My heart falls into my feet. “Oh,” I say, a little broken. “Well then. I get it. It’s fine if you don’t see me that way. I just thought — “  
A finger is pressed to my lips, and I would probably go cross eyed trying to look at it if I had two eyes.  
“I’m not done talking.” I look back up and he holds my gaze. “I don’t want to mislead you. I’ll admit that, for a bit there, I wasn’t able to conceive of you as a man”  
I hold my breath.  
“But it’s impossible for me not to look at you being the same reckless, brash, lovable idiot that you and not see the person that I — “ He sucks at his teeth for a second, the hand on my shoulder tightening. I do not look away. “That I fell in love with. And I think that no matter what, that I would fall in love with you again, man or woman. You’re a light in the dark, Hua Ping. Like a martial god descended to the earth.”  
I’m redder than a haw berry listening to this. How very Li Shang of him, to offer up such a sappy speech, but it makes my heart swell nonetheless.  
“But I want you to know what it would be for us to be together. What consequences that would have on our futures. What we would be giving up.” He pauses for a moment, to see that I am taking this all in. I shake my head.  
“It’s not as if I was expecting for us to be married, Shang. I have already left any possibilities of that behind me. But I don’t care about that. I have cast all the teachings of Confucius aside by choosing this life, and my ancestors have yet to punish me for it. It does not matter to me if no one else recognises our union. What matters is that I can have you.”  
I place my hand over the one on my shoulder and grip it with all the strength and longing I put into my embrace with Wei. There is a pause as he looks into my eye, before finally the sadness evaporates from his face and he breaks into a slow grin. One begins to spread across my own as well. He bends over towards me, and for a moment it seems like he is going to kiss me, but instead he rests his forehead against my own. His right arm goes around my waist and we stand there together, faces so close I can feel the warmth of his breath on my face.  
After a moment he says, “So what next?”  
“Hmmm?” I pull back to look at him, my chin against his collarbone.  
“Where do we go from here?” he asks. “The war is over. The emperor no longer has need of us. We’re free to go. What do you want to do?”  
I bite my lip, familiar anxiety beginning to twist in my stomach. Wei’s words return to me. Whatever you choose, just know you’re not alone. Without the war I would quite literally not be who I am, and I have spent so long worrying what I’ll be without it. But I am not alone in this — there are men like Shang, raised and trained just to fight and die for the Emperor.. There are men like Wei, whose bodies have been broken, who physically cannot return to their former lives. There are men like my father, forever haunted by what they saw, never able to restore their peace of mind. All of us are not the people we were before. Like all the generations before us, we will have to navigation this fragile new stage of our lives and learn who we are all over again. And we will not have to do it alone.  
“I want to go home,” I say. “To say goodbye to my father. To see my family, even if it’s for the last time. Will you come with me?”  
He nods. “Of course I will, Ping. There’s nothing for me in this city anyway.”  
“Good.” I extricate myself from his embrace and start towards the door with a playful wink, preparing to head back to my own room. “Then you shouldn’t have a problem with heading out tomorrow.”  
I don’t wait to hear his response as I slide the door shut.

The emperor — or rather, his advisors — is more than happy to provide us with the gold and horseflesh for our journey. It takes a certain amount of wheedling, but Shang is eventually convinced that I can ride a horse one-handed. Whatever the terms of our new relationship are, they do not involve me riding behind him like some delicate maiden. I saddle up my precious Fengfeng, somehow returned to the Imperial Stables, and we set out.  
For the first time in forever, I feel truly free. Out here, on the road, there are no rules to follow, no expectations to uphold. Now that the air is cleared between us, I have nothing to hide from Shang. Unlike our trip into the city, our trip out is not permeated with tense silences and uncomfortable glances. There are no kisses — there have been none to follow up my first clumsy attempt — but what does pass between us, the casual intimacy of hands brushing as we set up camp, or falling asleep on the other’s shoulder after an evening of star-gazing, is more than enough.  
“I wish I could read the stars,” I tell Shang on night, as we lie on our bedrolls and look up at the great expanse of the heavens.  
“Hmmm?” He moves closer to me, a hand coming to lie on my waist.  
“Maybe then I could see what fate has in store for me. Whether I’m on the path my ancestors intended for me.”  
Shang laughs gently. “If this is not the path, would you care?”  
I roll over to face him, to fully take in all that I have here. There is just enough light out to tell that he is smiling.  
“No. If this is wrong, then I don’t want to be right. But still.” I look up at the sky again. One of the stars, part of what I think is the white tiger, winks at me. An ancestor? A distant god? “Some sort of heavenly validation would be nice.”  
“You know what I think?” The hand on my waist holds me tighter, and I lay my hand over top of it. It is almost nothing, something innocent enough that a passerby could still mistake us for friends, two grown boys watching the stars. Yet it is more than I ever would have thought I could allow myself. “I think that the most impressive part about you, Ping, is that you’ve reached this understanding about yourself without any guidance, celestial or otherwise. There is this teaching of Bodhidharma.” He grins sheepishly for a moment, as if aware of what he’s about to say might be foolish. “Now, I won’t pretend to be a master of Buddhist philosophy. I’m not even that devout — you’ve heard me invoke the gods before. But one of the teachings of Bodhidharma is that in order to achieve enlightenment, you must achieve self-realisation, self understanding. According to the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, everything in the world is just a manifestation of the mind, so in order to understand yourself, you have to look beyond the physical, to understand that the physical is an illusion. Even the mind itself, to an extent, is a construction.”  
I furrow my brow. Illusions? Manifestations of the mind? And I thought remembering all the gods and their celestial hierarchy was too much.  
“Sorry, Shang, but you’ve already lost me.”  
He laughs gently. “Yes. It’s not the easiest thing to understand, especially when you’re eight and your father is making you study philosophical texts. But the way I take it is that the physical you is not the real you. Your true self, whatever that is, lies within, and you cannot understand yourself until you learn to search for that inner truth. And that is what you have done.”  
He pats me in a congratulatory manner. “You have gained an understanding of yourself beyond the physical, Ping, and you did not have a master to teach you how. Or —” He flushes. It is always so wonderful to see that handsome, proud face go red. “Or a classmate there to tell you that they’ve shared your experience, that they too feel the same way.” His eyes go distant for a moment as he recalls old memories from the military academy. Likely some pretty boy, I think with a touch of jealousy.  
“So I’m a bodhisattva, now, huh,” I joke, to break him from his revere.  
He scowls, though his eyes are bright now.  
“I’m just saying, the fact that you have reached this conviction without any precedent or aid is pretty amazing. I certainly wasn’t able to have any self-discoveries without a little help.”  
“A little help being some schoolboy’s lips?”  
“Ping!” He swats at me and I roll away, laughing. “You didn’t used to be so vulgar.”  
“I don’t see how you can live amongst soldiers and not become vulgar.” I wipe a stray tear of laughter from my eye. “I’ll tell you, I learned more about the conception of children from one day in camp than I ever did in my sixteen years of being raised as a woman. All my mother ever told me about it was, ‘it will get easier.’ By the gods, I’m glad I’ll never have to deal with that.”  
A sudden awkward silence falls, in which all that is heard are the crickets chirping in the high grass around us. After a moment Shang rolls over and closes his eyes.  
"Good night, Ping."  
I lie still, still concentrated on the stars.  
"Good night, Shang."

I lose my nerve a few days later. We are riding along as usual, nothing out of the ordinary, when we come to a part where the road runs along the banks of the Huang He River. My blood freezes the moment recognition sets in. The spot where Wei and I first camped together, two strangers on their way to becoming soldiers. I was so insecure then, so unsure of what I was doing. What troubles me about it, though, is that it means we are barely a day away from my village.  
Visions flash before me — of my sister, painted mouth wide as she grins at me and calls me her mèimei; my mother, welcoming me with loving arms but a dead, dry name on her tongue. Or worse, my mother turning away from me, cursing me, telling me I am mad. My breath catches in my throat and for a moment I think I am going to suffocate on my own unshed tears. My chest starts to heave, my bruised ribs protesting as I cling to the reigns and try not to lose myself. My surrounds begin to fade away as the faces of my relatives, eyes dark and mouths set in hard lines of disapproval, loom in my mind. A presence beside me.  
“Are you alright?” Shang asks.  
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I manage to squeeze out, every word a fight against my spiralling panic. He reads the expression on my face — this is not the first time he has seen me break down, after all, though it may also just be from his experience as an officer — and with the practise that comes from years of friendship, he carefully takes Fengfeng’s reigns and guides us to the side of the path.  
“Breath,” he says gently, close but not touching me. “That’s right. Yī ...Èr... Sān…” He continues counting slowly until the world stops spinning. “We don’t have to go to your family, Ping. If it’s too much for you then we can just stop here for a while and enjoy the river.”  
“No,” I insist, still shaky. “I have to go. I need —-I don’t know. I did this all for my father, and I need to lay everything to rest.”  
“Very well.” Shang hands me back my reigns. “You do what you need to do, and I’ll be there if you need me.”  
It’s laughable that he thinks I’m the strong one. If I didn’t have him, or Wei, or my officers, or even Yao and Co, then I would have fallen apart a long, long time ago.

The village is entirely foreign, yet somehow the same. These are the same streets I wandered as a child, the same low houses and good luck banners fluttering in the breeze. There’s even the matchmaker’s hut. How I dreaded visits to that house. I remember trudging up to her gate, head low and miserable in my garish facepaint and robes so tight I could barely put one foot in front of the other. The faces, though, are different. I do not recognise the children racing between market stalls as they play cat and mouse. The young women, stiff and glassy eyed as they carry out household chores, are not the little girls I once played with. They are mothers now, babies strapped to their backs or husbands calling to them from the porch.  
I recognise one woman as Zi Xuefeng. She had been a pretty thing, a few years younger than me, and some of the richest men in the village had had their eyes on her both for her looks and her handsome dowry. At the time I had expected that I would be there at her wedding, or at least amongst the crowd of girls to gossip and hold her hand the night before. I would have had a husband of my own, then, and would have told her the same wedding-night secrets that my mother had promised to share with me.  
Now, however, her face is puffy and her eyes dull, her pregnant belly distended as she walks by with a retinue of servants. Her eyes land on me, devoid of any recognition.  
“Thank you for your service, noble sirs,” she mumbles to us as she passes, her hand going to her stomach. A vague gesture of respect, one I have heard so often that the words have begun to lose all meaning. I do not know whether I should be disappointed or pleased that she cannot recognise me now.  
She stumbles and a servant puts a hand to her back.  
“Careful, Mistress Pan.”  
So Pan is her husband, then. That old lech. I bet his third wife was still warm in her grave when he snatched up Xuefeng. I can picture him rutting over her, sweaty and panting, as she gazes unseeing at the ceiling above her. My mouth curls in disgust.  
“If you’re reincarnated, Mr Buddhist,” I tell Shang. “Pray you are not reborn a woman.”  
He nods, a little dazed.

We come at last to the place I once called home. It is one of the largest homes in the village, a symbol of my father’s status as a war hero, but there is something depressing about it. An air of death hangs over us. Even without a white banner out front, it is clear that this is a household in mourning. Dread rising in my stomach as I step onto the porch and call out.  
“Hua Li! I wish to speak with you!”  
There is a rustling within, and the front door slides open a bit. A servant peers out.  
“Miss Du,” I say softly, soothed by the appearance of a familiar face. “It has been a long time, has it not?”  
Miss Du’s mouth hangs open. “Wha — It can’t be — Please come in. I’ll go fetch Mistress Hua.”  
She scurries away, leaving the door open. I turn back to Shang, hesitating.  
He smiles, and, so quickly I barely register it, leans in and gives me a chaste peck on the lips.  
“For good luck,” he whispers as he squeezes my hand. “I’ll be waiting right out here.”  
I nod, still trying to process that press of warmth against my lips.

My mother sits in the kitchen, her eyes dark and downcast. She is robed in the white dress of mourning, made of coarse cloth, and her hair is undone. I enter tentatively, unsure if I can break the silence.  
“I’m home, Mother,” I murmur, like I’ve just been over to a friend’s house. She raises her face to look at me. She looks so impossibly old, so fragile, compared to when I left her.  
“Mulan,” she breathes.  
A shard of glass lodges itself in my chest. “I’m not Mulan,” I respond, almost reflexively. “My name is Hua Ping.”  
Something hard and bitter glints in her eyes, and I realise there was no point in me saying it.  
“That’s right. You’re not my daughter.”  
For a moment hope sparks in my breast, before she continues.  
“My daughter is dead. War took her from me, just like it took my husband”  
“But Father —”  
“You wouldn’t understand,” she snaps. “You didn’t know him, before he was a soldier. When we were first married.” She pauses, looks to the ceiling. Holding back tears. “I don’t blame you,” my mother says at last. “I blame the war, the Rouran, the emperor. But you are not my child.” She stares at me, long and hard. “I don’t see Hua Mulan when I look at you. I see a stranger with my daughter’s face..”  
I suck in a breath. How can she say that, when I’m standing here in front of her? I’m not Hua Mulan, but I am still her child. I am still me. And I will never, ever, stop being me.  
“Mother — “  
“Don’t call me that!” Her hands clench into fists as her face screws up in pain. A single tear runs down her cheek. “You cannot understand how I feel right now. When the servants told me a guest was here some part of me hoped that you would be the same. That I could take you up in my arms and everything could be normal again. But no. I took one look at you and knew my little girl was gone.”  
I want to scream at her. I want to draw my sword and point it at her, demand that she look at me. I want to smash every pot and vase in the room. I want to lay down on the floor and cry until the world ends. Instead I just stand, speechless, as my mother cries in front of me.  
“I never should’ve let you go,” she sobs. “I knew it was a bad idea. I should’ve begged him to stop you. Gods curse me, I have failed as a mother! I had one duty in this world, and I couldn’t manage even that. Oh, look what my mistake has done to you. I have let my girl’s yin, her womanhood, be corrupted, let her fill her head with foolish fantasies.” She takes a deep breath and I back away, at the edge of what I can take. “It was all that time Zhou spent playing soldier with you. I knew it was going to damage your mind, and yet I did nothing. Now I am just paying the price.”  
So this is what I am to her. A punishment. A reminder of her mistakes. Why do people always have to make this about them? About their pain? Does she not have a thought to spare of what this is like for me, to have my own mother denounce me? At least, I think, there is still Yao Er. He, at least, knows me only as his brother.  
“I am going to pay my respects to Father,” I mutter, turning away from her.  
“Go,” she whispers. “Leave me be. I have a husband and daughter to mourn.” 

I leave her, heart heavy in my chest. As much as it hurts, I cannot say I am surprised. I brush past the bewildered servants and head for the backroom I know contains the family altar.  
I approach on light feet and kneel before it. My hands shake slightly as I light the incense stick and place it before my father’s spirit tablet. Is his po still in there, listening to me, or has it descended into the earth? Are the ancestors looking down on me now from the heavens and shaking their heads? I take a deep, shuddering breath. There is something illicit to this, knowing that Yao Er is the one expected to speak the ancestors now. Too bad. I am the eldest son now.  
“Hey there, Father,” I start tentatively. My voice shakes almost as much as my hands. “I bet you weren’t expecting me to be the one sitting here and talking to you, huh? Well, a lot has changed since I left.” I rub my nose, trying to think of what to say next. If there are rules to this, I was certainly never taught them, so I guess I’ll just figure things out.  
“You should hear what they say about me in the capital, Father. I think you would be proud. I — “ The tears I have been holding back all this time suddenly threaten to choke me. I look up to the ceiling, either to the heavens or to keep the tears from coming. “I did my best to become the little soldier boy you always wanted. I hope — “ Try as I might, they still come. Hot tears pour from my eye and down my face as sobs wrack my body. “Bàba,” I wail, suddenly a child again. “I did this all for you. I hope you know that.” I press my fists against the floor. “And I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry for not writing. I’m sorry for not being here for you, for your vigil. I’m sorry I upset Māma. I love you, Bàba. Wherever you are, I just want you to know that.” The words come out as barely a whisper as I lower my head against the floor and dissolve into silent sobs.

Shang starts up as I walk out, concern in his warm eyes as he comes up to me.  
“I take it things didn’t go too well,” he says softly. I snuffle and wipe a tear from my blotchy face.  
“It’s fine,” I mutter. “I did what I came here to do.”  
“You don’t want to go see your sister.”  
“No.” As much as I love her, I don’t need a repeat for my mother’s anger and confusion. Besides, I have no need for anything from my old life anymore. I have new friends, new clothes, a new name. I have whatever it is I have with Shang. He takes my hand in his as we walk back to where we hitched our horses.  
“So,” he asks, as he helps me mount Fengfeng. “What’s next?”  
I look out to the horizon, past the farmland and the winding river, to the distant, misty mountains. A cool breeze blows, lifts the stray strands of hair from my face and drying the tears from my cheek. There are the faint sounds of life coming from the village, but right here there is nothing but the wind and the breathing of the horses.  
“I don’t know,” I say at last, taking up Fengfeng’s reigns. “But we’ve got time. Why don’t we go and figure it out?” I turn to look at him, see him smiling at me. “Together.”  
“Together,” he echoes.  
And for the first time since I saw that draft poster, maybe for the first time in my life, I know that everything will be alright.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So there it is. My longest work ever, five months in the making. My third finished work. I've poured so many hours into planning, plotting, and writing this fic, not to mention researching all of the historical aspects, talking with my proofreaders, and sketching character designs. Massive, massive thanks to all of my readers. Your comments really make my day and are the only thing that kept this thing going. So, one last time, thank you. I'm considering posting a collection of cut subplots/deleted scenes, so if anyone is interested just leave a comment!


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